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THE 

TRIP    TO    ENGLAND. 

BY 

WILLIAM    WINTER. 

^tconi  €!)Uu)n,  |ltfaistJ(  anb  €nbr(jtli. 
With  Illustrations  v.y  Joseph  Jefferson. 


".l/v  /idirl  is  /illcd  -with  fond  yet  melancholy  emotions  : 
and  still  t  linger,  and  still,  like  a  child  leaving  the 
venerable  abodes   o/  his  /ore/athers,    I  turn    to   breathe 

forth  a  filial  benediction  :  Peace  be  within  thy  -vails, 
O     England  I   and    plenteousness    nithin     thy    palaces: 

for  my  brethren  and  my  companions'  sake.  I  will  now 
say.   Peace    be    within   //K-i>.'"— WaSMIXGTON    IrviXG. 


BOSTON: 
JAMES    R.   OSGOOD    AND    COMPANY. 

I  88  I. 


Copyright  1878  and  1880, 
By  William  Winter. 

All  Rights  Reserved. 


University  Press : 


i 

yohn  Wilso7i  and  Son,  Cavthridge^  I 

I 


TO 

WHIT  EL  AW     REID, 

WITH     ESTEEM      FOR      HIS     PUBLIC      CAREER, 

WITH      HONOUR      !•■  O  R      HIS     PURE     CHARACTER, 

AND     WITH     AFFECTIONATE     FRIENDSHIP, 

THIS     MEMORIAL 

OF     LOVELY     SCENES      ^MJ      HAPPY     MOMENTS 
IS      DEDICATED 

BY 
THE     AUTHOR. 


*h 


(»■ 


1^=^ 


CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

I.  Tnii  Voyage ii 


II.   The  Beauty  of  England 


19 


III.  Rambles  in  London 30 

IV.  A  Visir  to  Windsor 39 

V.   The  Palace  of  Westminster 48 

\I.    Warwick  and  Kenilwokth 57 

VII.   Stratford-on-Avon- 64 

VIII.    A  Glimpse  of  France 75 

IX.   English  Home  Sentiment S4 

X.   London  Nooks  and  Corners 89 

XL   The  Tower  and  the  Lyron  ^Memorial  9S 
XII.  W^estminster   Ar.nEY 106 

XIII.   The  Home  of  Shakespeare 119 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRA  TIONS. 

Heliotypes,  from   Sketches   by  Joseph  Jefferson. 


I.   Windsor  Castle. 
II.   Windsor  Park. 

III.  The  Victoria  Tower,  at  Westminster. 

IV.  The  Thames  from  Richmond. 
V.   The  Avenue  at  Guy's  Cliff. 

VI.   Warwick  Castle  on  the  Avon. 
VII.  The  Road  to  Stratford. 
VIII.   Distant  View  of  Kenilworth. 
IX.   Rouen. 


PREFACE. 


'T^HE  letters  that  form  this  volume  ivere  first 
■^  published     in     the    New- York     Tribune, 

from  which  journal  they  are  now  reprinted, 
with  a  few  changes  and  additions.  Their 
writer  passed  ten  weeks  of  the  sutn/ner  of  1877  in 
England  and  France,  where  he  met  with  a  great 
and  surprising  kindness,  and  where  he  saw  many 
beautiful  and  fnemorable  things.  These  letters 
were  written  because  he  wished  to  commemorate  — 
however  inadequately  —  a  delightful  experience: 
and  they  are  now  presented  in  this  form,  at  the 
kind  request  of  many  persons — strangers  as  -cuell 
as  friends  —  to  whotn,  and  to  all  other  readers,  it 
is  hoped  they  may  bring  an  hour  of  peaceful  and 
pleasant  reverie. 

IV.  W. 
New- York,  Noveinber  IGth,  1S7S. 


NOTE  TO  THE  SECOND  EDITION. 

'V  ^HE  text  of  this  volume  has  been  rei'ised,  for 
the presetit  edition,  by  the  correction  of  one 
or  tivo  errors,  and  by  the  improvement  of  a  few 
phrases.  A  chapter  also  has  been  added,  con- 
taining a  paper  on  The  Home  of  Shakespeare, 
written  by  me  for  Harper's  Magazine,  and  first 
published  in  May,  1S79,  to  record,  for  the  American 
public,  the  dedication  of  the  Shakespeare  Memorial, 
at  Stratford  That  paper  was  embellished,  in  the 
Magazine,  with  beautiful  ilhistrations,  —  equally 
poetical  and  truth  fid,  — by  Edward  A.  Abbey. 
A  repetition  of  somewhat  familiar  facts  was  found 
unavoidable  by  the  writer,  but  perhaps  this  will 
not  be  fotcnd  tedious  by  the  reader. 

W.  W. 
Fort  Hill,  New  Brighton,  S.  I. 
June  21,  iSSo. 


»f< 


THE    TRIP    TO    ENGLAND. 


>h 


This  royal  throne  of  kings,  this  sceptred  isle, 

This  earth  of  7najesty,  this  seat  of  Mars, 

This  other  Eden,  demi-paradise. 

This  fortress  built  by  nature  for  herself. 

This  precious  stone  set  in  the  silver  sea, 

This  blessed  plot,  this  earth,  this  realm,  this  England, 

This  land  of  such  dear  souls,  this  dear,  dear  land. 

Dear  for  her  reputation  through  the  7uorld ! 

Shakespeare. 


THE  TRIP   TO   ENGLAND. 


I. 


THE  VOYAGE. 


THE  coast  line  recedes  and  disappears,  and 
niglit  comes  down  upon  the  ocean.  Into 
what  dangers  will  the  great  ship  plunge  ?  Through 
what  mysterious  waste  of  waters  will  she  make  her 
viewless  path  ?  The  black  waves  roll  up  around 
her.  The  strong  blast  fills  her  sails  and  whistles 
through  her  creaking  cordage.  Overhead  the 
stars  shine  dimly  amidst  the  driving  clouds.  Mist 
and  gloom  close  in  the  dubious  prospect,  and  a 
strange  sadness  settles  upon  the  heart  of  the 
vovairer  —  who  has  left  his  home  behind,  and  who 
now  seeks,  for  the  first  time,  the  land,  the  homes, 
and  the  manners  of  the  stranger.     Thoughts  and 


12  The  Trip  to  England. 

iinages  of  the  past  crowd  thick  upon  his  remem- 
brance. The  faces  of  absent  friends  rise  up  before 
him,  wliom,  perliaps,  he  is  destined  never  more 
to  behold.  He  sees  their  smiles  ;  he  hears  their 
voices  ;  he  fancies  them  by  familiar  hearth-stones, 
in  the  hght  of  the  evening  lamps.  They  are  very 
far  away  now  ;  and  already  it  seems  months  in- 
stead of  hours  since  tlie  parting  moment.  Vain 
now  the  pang  of  regret  for  misunderstandings, 
unkindness,  neglect ;  for  golden  moments  slighted, 
and  gentle  courtesies  left  undone.  He  is  alone 
upon  the  wild  sea  —  all  the  more  alone  because 
surrounded  with  new  faces  of  unknown  compan- 
ions—  and  the  best  he  can  do  is  to  seek  his  lonely 
pillow,  and  lie  down  with  a  prayer  in  his  heart  and 
on  his  lips.  Never  before  did  he  so  clearly  know 
—  never  again  will  he  so  deeply  feel  —  the  uncer- 
tainty of  human  life  and  the  weakness  of  human 
nature.  Yet,  as  he  notes  the  rush  and  throb  of 
the  vast  ship,  and  the  noise  of  the  breaking  waves 
around  her,  and  thinks  of  the  mighty  deep  be- 
neath, and  the  broad  and  melancholy  expanse  that 
stretches  away  on  every  side,  he  cannot  miss  the 
impression  —  grand,  noble,  and  thrilling  —  of  hu- 
man courage,  skill,  and  power.  For  this  ship  is 
the  centre  of  a  splendid  conflict.  Man  and  the  ele- 
ments are  here  at  war  ;  and  man  makes  conquest 
of  the  elements  by  using  them  as  weapons  against 
themselves.  Strong  and  brilliant,  the  head-light 
streams  over  the  boilin<r  surges.     Lanthorns  gleam 


The   l\)yage.  13 

in  the  tops.  Dark  fissures  keep  watch  upon  the 
prow.  The  officer  of  the  nii^iit  is  at  his  post 
upon  the  bridge.  Let  clanger  threaten  howso- 
ever it  may,  it  cannot  come  unawares  ;  it  cannot 
subdue,  without  a  tremendous  struggle,  tlie  brave 
minds  and  hardy  bodies  that  are  here  arrayed  to 
meet  it.  With  this  thought,  perhaps,  the  weary 
voyager  sinks  to  sleep  ;  and  this  is  his  first  night 
at  sea. 

There  is  no  tediousness  of  solitude  to  him  who 
has  within  himself  resources  of  thought  and  dream, 
the  pleasures  and  pains  of  memory,  the  bliss  and 
the  torture  of  imagination.  It  is  best  to  have  few 
acquaintances  —  or  none  at  all  —  on  shipboard. 
Human  companionship,  at  some  times  (and  this 
is  one  of  them),  distracts  by  its  pettiness.  The 
voyager  should  yield  himself  to  nature,  now,  and 
meet  his  own  soul  face  to  face.  The  routine  of 
every-day  life  is  commonplace  enough,  equally 
upon  sea  and  land.  But  the  ocean  is  a  continual 
pageant,  filling  and  soothing  the  mind  with  un- 
speakable peace.  Never,  in  even  the  grandest 
words  of  poetry,  was  the  grandeur  of  the  sea  ex- 
pressed. Its  vastness,  its  freedom,  its  joy,  and  its 
beauty  overwhelm  the  mind.  All  things  else  seem 
puny  and  momentary  beside  the  life  which  by 
tliis  immense  creation  is  unfolded  and  inspired. 
Sometimes  it  shines  in  the  sun,  a  wilderness  of 
shimmering  silver.  Sometimes  its  lono:  waves  are 
black,  smooth,  glittering,  and  dangerous.     Some- 


14  The  Trip  to  England. 

times  it  seems  instinct  with  a  superb  wrath,  and 
its  huge  masses  rise,  and  clash  together,  and  break 
into  crests  of  foam.  Sometimes  it  is  grey  and 
quiet,  as  if  in  a  sullen  sleep.  Sometimes  the  white 
mist  broods  upon  it,  and  deepens  the  sense  of 
awful  mystery  by  which  it  is  forever  enwrapped. 
At  night,  its  surging  billows  are  furrowed  with 
Jong  streaks  of  phosphorescent  fire  ;  or,  it  may  be, 
the  waves  roll  gently,  under  the  soft  light  of  stars  ; 
or  all  the  waste  is  dim,  save  where,  beneath  the 
moon,  a  glorious  pathway,  broadening  out  to  the 
far  horizon,  allures  and  points  to  heaven.  One  of 
the  most  exquisite  delights  of  the  voyage,  whether 
by  day  or  night,  is  to  lie  upon  the  deck,  in  some 
secluded  spot,  and  look  up  at  the  tall,  tapering 
spars  as  they  sway  wiih  the  motion  of  the  ship, 
while  over  them  the  white  clouds  float,  in  ever- 
changing  shapes,  or  the  starry  constellations  drift, 
in  their  eternal  march.  No  need  now  of  books,  or 
newspapers,  or  talk  !  The  eyes  are  fed  by  every 
object  they  behold.  The  great  ship,  with  all  her 
white  wings  spread,  careening  like  a  tiny  sail-boat, 
dips  and  rises,  with  sinuous,  stately  grace.  The 
clank  of  her  engines  —  fit  type  of  steadfast  industry 
and  purpose  —  goes  steadily  on.  The  song  of  the 
sailors  —  "  Give  me  some  time  to  blow  the  man 
down "  —  rises  in  cheery  melody,  full  of  auda- 
cious, light-hearted  thoughtlessness,  and  strangely 
tinged  with  the  romance  of  the  sea.  Far  out 
toward  the  horizon  a  school  of  whales  come  sport- 


The   Voyage.  15 

ing  and  spouting  along.  At  once,  out  of  the 
distant  bank  of  cloud  and  mist,  a  little  vessel 
springs  into  view,  and  with  short,  jerking  move- 
ment —  tilling  up  and  down  like  the  miniature 
barque  upon  an  old  Dutch  clock  —  dances  across 
the  vista  and  vanishes  into  space.  Soon  a  tempest 
bursts  upon  the  calm  ;  and  then,  safe-housed  from 
the  fierce  blast  and  blinding  rain,  the  voyager 
exults  over  the  stern  battle  of  winds  and  waters, 
and  the  stalwart,  undaunted  strength  with  which 
his  ship  bears  down  the  furious  floods  and  stems 
the  gale.  By  and  by  a  quiet  hour  is  given,  when, 
met  together  with  all  the  companions  of  his  jour- 
ney, he  stands  in  the  hushed  cabin,  and  liears  the 
voice  of  prayer  and  the  hymn  of  praise  ;  and,  in  the 
pauses,  a  gentle  ripple  of  waves  against  the  ship, 
which  now  rocks  lazily  upon  the  quiet  deep  —  and, 
ever  and  anon,  as  she  dips,  he  can  discern  through 
her  open  ports  the  shining  sea,  and  the  wheeling 
and  circling  gulls  that  have  come  out  to  welcome 
her  to  the  shores  of  the  Old  World. 

The  present  writer,  when  first  he  saw  the  dis- 
tant and  dim  coast  of  Britain,  felt  with  a  sense  of 
forlorn  loneliness,  that  he  vvas  a  stranger;  but, 
when  last  he  saw  that  coast,  he  beheld  it  through 
a  mist  of  tears,  and  knew  that  he  had  parted  from 
many  cherished  friends,  from  many  of  the  gentlest 
men  and  women  upon  the  earth,  and  from  a  land 
henceforth  as  dear  to  him  as  his  own.  England 
is  a  countrv  which  to  see  is  to  love.     As  vou  draw 


1 6  The  Trip  to  England. 

near  to  her  shores  you  are  pleased,  at  once,  with 
the  air  of  careless  finish  and  nesHsfent  gfrace 
which  everywhere  overhangs-  the  prospect.  The 
grim,  wind-beaten  hills  of  Ireland  have  first  been 
passed  —  hills  crowned,  here  and  there,  with  dark, 
fierce  tow-ers  that  look  like  strongholds  of  an- 
cient bandit  chiefs,  and  cleft  by  dim  valleys  that 
seem  to  promise  endless  mystery  and  romance, 
hid  in  their  sombre  depths.  Passed  also  is  white 
Queenstown,  with  its  lovely  little  bay,  its  circle 
of  green  hill-sides,  and  its  valiant  fort ;  and  pictur- 
esque Fastnet,  witli  its  gaily  painted  tower,  has 
long  been  left  behind.  It  is  off  the  noble  crags 
of  Holyhead  that  the  voyager  first  observes  with 
what  a  deft  skill  the  hand  of  art  has  here  moulded 
nature's  luxuriance  into  forms  of  seemins;  chance- 
born  beauty ;  and  from  that  hour,  wherever  in 
rural  England  the  footsteps  of  the  pilgrim  may 
roam,  he  will  behold  nothing  but  gentle  rustic 
adornment,  that  has  grown  with  the  grass  and 
the  roses  —  greener  grass  and  redder  roses  than 
ever  we  see  in  our  Western  World!  In  the 
English  nature  a  love  of  the  beautiful  is  sponta- 
neous ;  and  the  operation  of  it  is  as  effortless  as 
the  blowing  of  the  summer  wind.  Portions  of 
English  cities,  indeed,  are  hard,  and  harsh,  and 
coarse  enough  to  suit  the  most  utilitarian  taste  ; 
yet,  even  in  these  regions  of  dreary  monotony, 
the  national  love  of  flowers  will  find  expression, 
and  the  people,  without  being  aware  of  it,  will,  in 


The   Voyage.  17 

many  odd  little  ways,  beautify  their  homes  and 
make  their  surroundings  pictorial,  at  least  to  stran- 
ger eyes.  There  is  a  tone  of  rest  and  home-like 
comfort  even  in  murky  Liverpool ;  and  great  mag- 
nificence is  there  —  as  well  of  architecture  and  opu- 
lent living  as  of  enterprize  and  action.  "Towered 
cities "  and  "  the  busy  hum  of  men,"  however, 
are  soon  left  behind  by  the  wise  traveller  in  Eng- 
land. A  time  will  come  for  these  ;  but  in  his  first 
sojourn  there  he  soon  discovers  the  two  things 
which  are  utterly  to  absorb  him  —  which  can- 
not disappoint  —  and  which  are  the  fulfilment  of 
all  his  dreams,  and  the  reward  of  all  his  patience 
and  labour:  These  things  are  —  the  rustic  love- 
liness of  the  land,  and  the  charm  of  its  always  vital 
and  splendid  antiquity.  The  green  lanes,  the 
thatch-roof  cottages,  the  meadows  glorious  with 
wild  flowers,  the  little  churches  covered  with  dark- 
green  ivy,  the  Tudor  fronts  festooned  with  roses, 
the  devious  foot-paths  that  wind  across  wild  heaths 
and  long  and  lonesome  fields,  the  narrow,  shining 
rivers,  brimful  to  their  banks,  and  crossed  here 
and  there  with  grey  and  moss-grown  bridges,  the 
stately  elms,  whose  low-hanging  branches  droop 
over  a  turf  of  emerald  velvet,  the  gnarled  beech- 
trees  "  that  wreathe  their  old,  fantastic  roots  so 
high,"  the  rooks  that  caw  and  circle  in  the  air, 
the  sweet  winds  that  blow  from  fragrant  woods,  the 
sheep  and  the  deer  that  rest  in  shady  places,  the 
pretty  children  who  cluster  round  the  porches  of 


1 8  The  Trip  to  England. 

their  cleanly,  cosey  homes,  and  peep  at  the  way- 
farer as  he  passes,  the  numerous  and  often  bril- 
liant birds  that  at  times  fill  the  air  with  music,  the 
brief,  light,  pleasant  rains  that  ever  and  anon 
refresh  the  landscape  —  these  are  some  of  the 
every-day  joys  of  rural  England  ;  and  these  are 
wrapped  in  a  chmate  that  makes  life  one  serene 
ecstacy.  Meantime,  in  rich  valleys  or  on  verdant 
slopes,  a  thousand  old  castles  and  monasteries, 
ruined  or  half  in  ruins,  allure  the  pilgrim's  gaze, 
inspire  his  imagination,  arouse  his  memory,  and 
fill  his  mind.  The  best  romance  of  the  past  and 
the  best  reality  of  the  present  are  his  banquet 
now  ;  and  nothing  is  Scanting  to  the  perfection  of 
the  feast.  I  thought  that  life  could  have  but  few 
moments  of  happiness  in  store  for  me  like  the 
moment  —  never  to  be  forgotten  !  —  when,  in  the 
heart  of  London,  on  a  perfect  June  day,  I  lay  upon 
the  grass  in  the  old  Green  Park,  and,  for  the  first 
time,  looked  up  to  the  towers  of  Westminster 
Abbey. 


n. 


THE  BEAUTY   OF  ENGLAND. 


T  ONDON,  July  71I1,  1877.  —  It  is  not  strange 
that  Englishmen  should  be  —  as  certainly  they 
are  —  passionate  lovers  of  their  country;  for  their 
country  is,  almost  beyond  parallel,  peaceful,  gentle 
and  beautiful.  Even  in  this  vast  city,  where  prac- 
tical life  asserts  itself  with  such  prodigious  force, 
the  stranger  is  impressed,  in  every  direction,  with 
a  sentiment  of  repose  and  peace.  This  sentiment 
seems  to  proceed  in  part  from  the  antiquity  of  the 
social  system  here  established,  and  in  part  from 
the  affectionate  nature  of  the  English  people.  Here 
are  finished  towns,  rural  regions  thoroughly  culti- 
vated and  exquisitely  adorned  ;  ancient  architec- 
ture, cruml)ling  in  slow  decay ;  and  a  soil  so  rich 


20  The  Trip  to  Eiigland. 

and  pure  that  even  in  its  idlest  mood  it  lights  itself 
up  with  tlowers,  just  as  the  face  of  a  sleeping  child 
lights  itself  up  with  smiles.     Here,  also,  are  soft 
and  kindly  manners,  settled  principles,  good  laws, 
wise  customs  —  wise,  because  rooted  in  the  univer- 
sal  attributes   of  human  nature ;    and,  above  all, 
here  is  the  practice  of  trying  to  live  in  a  happy 
condition,  instead  of  trying  to  make  a  noise  about 
it.     Here,  accordingly,  life  is  soothed  and  hallowed 
with  the  comfortable,  genial,  loving  spirit  of  home. 
It   would,  doubtless,  be   easily  possible   to   come 
into  contact  here  with  absurd  forms  and  pernicious 
abuses,  to  observe  absurd  individuals,  and  to  trace 
out  veins  of  sordid  selfishness  and  of  evil  and  sor- 
row.    But  the  things  that  first  and  most  deeply  im- 
press the  fresh  observer  of  England  and  English 
society  are  their  potential,  manifold,  and  abundant 
sources  of  beauty,  refinement,  and  peace.      There 
are,  of  course,  grumblers.     Mention  has  been  made 
of  a  person  who,  even  in  heaven,  would  complain 
that  his  cloud  was  damp  and  his  halo  a  mis-fit.     We 
cannot  have  perfection  ;    but,  the  man  who  could 
not  be  happy  in  England  —  in  so  far,  at  least,  as 
happiness  depends  upon  e.xternal  objects  and  influ- 
ences—  could  not  reasonably  expect  to  be  hapjDy 
anywhere. 

Letters  tell  me  that  New- York  is  hot.  The 
statement  cannot  be  doubted  by  one  who  remem- 
bers what  July  was,  last  year,  in  that  city.  If  this 
July  resembles  its  departed  brother,  you  are  all  in- 


The  Beauty  of  England.  2 1 

deed,  the  proper  objects  of  pity.  Here  the  weatlicr 
is  literally  blissful.  It  behaved  a  little  shabbily 
during  the  first  days  of  June;  but  since  then  it  has 
been  delightful.  Summer  heat  is  perceptible  for 
an  hour  or  two  each  day,  but,  to  the  American 
sense  it  is  trivial,  and  it  causes  no  discomfort. 
Garments  that  we  in  New- York  should  wear  in 
October  are  quite  suitable  for  use  in  the  London 
July,  and  at  night  we  sleep  under  blankets,  and 
could  not  dispense  with  them.  Fog  has  refrained  ; 
though  it  is  understood  to  be  lurking  in  the  Irish 
Sea  and  the  British  Channel,  and  waiting  for  No- 
vember, when  it  will  drift  into  town  and  grime  all 
the  new  paint  on  the  London  houses.  Meantime, 
the  sky  is  softly  blue,  and  full  of  magnificent  bronze 
clouds ;  the  air  is  cool,  and,  in  the  environs  of  the 
city,  is  fragrant  with  the  scent  of  new-mown  hay; 
and  the  grass  and  trees  in  the  parks  —  those  copi- 
ous and  splendid  lungs  of  London  —  are  green, 
dewy,  sweet,  and  beautiful. 

Persons  "  to  the  manner  born  "  were  lately  call- 
ing the  season  '•  backward,"  and  they  went  so  far 
as  to  grumble  at  the  hawthorn,  as  being  less  bril- 
liant than  in  former  seasons.  But.  in  fact,  to  the 
unfamiliar  sense,  this  bush  of  odourous  coral  has 
been  delicious.  You  know  it,  doubtless,  as  one  of 
the  sweetest  beauties  of  rural  Endand.  It  de- 
serves  its  reputation.  We  have  nothing  compar- 
able with  it  in  northern  America,  unless,  perhap.s, 
it  be  the  elder,  of  our  wild  woods  ;  and  even  that. 


2  2  The  Trip  to  England. 

with  all  its  fragrance,  lacks  equal  charm  of  colour. 
They  use  the  hawthorn,  or  some  kindred  shrub,  for 
hedges,  in  this  country,  and  hence  their  fields  are 
seldom  disfigured  with  fences.  As  you  ride  through 
the  land,  you  see  miles  and  miles  of  meadow,  tra- 
versed by  these  green  and  blooming  hedge-rows  — 
which  give  the  country  a  charm  quite  incommuni- 
cable in  words.  The  green  of  the  foliajje  —  en- 
riched  by  an  uncommonly  humid  air,  and  burnished 
by  the  sun  —  is  just  now  in  perfection,  while  the 
flowers  are  out  in  such  abundance  that  the  whole 
realm  is  one  glowing  pageant.  I  saw  the  other  day, 
near  Oxford,  on  the  crest  of  a  hill,  a  single  patch  of 
at  least  three  thousand  square  yards  of  scarlet  pop- 
pies. You  can  imagine  what  a  glorious  dash  of 
colour  that  was,  in  a  green  landscape  lit  by  the  after- 
noon sun.  Nobody  could  help  loving  a  land  that 
woos  him  with  such  beauty. 

English  flowers,  it  must  often  have  been  noticed, 
are  exceptional  for  substance  and  pomp.  The 
roses,  in  particular  —  though  many  of  them,  it 
should  be  said,  are  of  French  breeds  —  surpass  all 
others.  It  may  seem  an  extravagance  to  say,  but 
it  is  certainly  true,  that  these  rich,  firm,  brilliant 
flowers  affect  you  like  creatures  of  flesh  and  blood. 
They  are,  in  this  respect,  only  to  be  described  as 
like  nothing  in  the  world  so  much  as  the  bright  lips 
and  blushing  cheeks  of  the  handsome  English  wo- 
men who  walk  among  them  and  vie  with  them  in 
health  and  loveliness.     It  is  easy  to  perceive  the 


The  Beauty  of  England.  23 

source  of  those  elements  of  wnrmth  and  sumptuous- 
ness  which  are  so  conspicuous  in  the  results  of 
English  taste.  This  a  land  of  flowers.  Even  in 
the  husiest  parts  of  London  the  people  decorate 
their  houses  with  them,  and  set  the  sorftbre,  fog- 
grimed  fronts  ablaze  with  scarlet  and  gold.  These 
are  the  prevalent  colours  (so  radically  such  that  they 
have  become  national),  and,  when  placed  against  the 
black  tint  with  which  this  climate  stains  the  build- 
ings, they  have  the  advantage  of  a  vivid  contrast 
which  much  augments  their  splendour.  All  Lon- 
don wears  "  a  suit  of  sables,"  variegated  with  a 
tracery  of  white,  like  lace  upon  a  pall.  In  some 
instances  the  effect  is  splendidly  pompous.  There 
cannot  be  a  grander  artificial  object  in  the  world 
than  the  front  of  St.  Paul's  Cathedral,  which  is 
especially  notable  for  this  mysterious  blending  of 
light  and  shade.  It  is  to  be  deplored  that  a  climate 
which  can  thus  beautify  should  also  destroy;  but 
there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  stones  of  England  are 
steadily  defaced  by  the  action  of  the  moist  atmos- 
phere. Already  the  delicate  carvings  on  the  Palace 
of  Westminster  are  beginning  to  crumble.  And 
yet,  if  one  might  judge  the  climate  by  this  glittering 
July,  England  is  a  land  of  sunshine  as  well  as  of 
flowers.  Light  comes  before  three  o'clock  in  the 
morning,  and  it  lasts,  throu;;h  a  dreamy  and  lovely 
"gloaming,"  till  nearly  ten  o'clock  at  night.  The 
morning  sky  is  usually  light  blue,  dappled  with 
slate-coloured  clouds.     A  few  large  stars  are  visible 


24  The  Trip  to  England. 

then,  lingering  to  outface  the  dawn.  Cool  winds 
whisper,  and  presently  they  rouse  the  great,  sleepy, 
old  elms  ;  and  then  the  rooks  —  which  are  the  low 
comedians  of  the  air,  in  this  region  — begin  to  grum- 
ble ;  and  then  the  sun  leaps  above  the  horizon,  and 
we  sweep  into  a  day  of  golden,  breezy  cheerfulness 
and  comfort,  the  like  of  which  is  rarely  or  never 
known  in  New-York,  between  June  and  October. 
Sometimes  the  whole  twenty-four  hours  have  drifted 
past,  as  if  in  a  dream  of  light,  and  fragrance,  and 
music.  In  a  recent  moonlight  time  there  was  scarce 
any  darkness  at  all  ;  and  more  than  once  or  twice 
I  have  lain  awake  all  night  —  within  a  few  miles  of 
Charing  Cross  —  listening  to  the  twitter  of  small 
birds  and  the  song  of  a  nightingale,  which  is  like 
the  lapse  and  fall  of  silver  water.  It  used  to  be 
difficult  to  understand  why  the  London  season 
should  begin  in  May  and  last  through  most  of  the 
summer ;  it  is  not  difficult  to  understand  the  cus- 
tom now. 

The  season  is  at  its  height.  Parliament  is  in 
session.  Both  of  the  opera  houses  are  open.  Hyde 
Park  is  alive  with  riders  and  drivers.  Thea- 
tres are  alert  and  competitive.  The  clubs  are 
thronged.  The  Briton  is  giving  his  serious  atten- 
tion to  dinner.  The  garden  party  makes  itself 
heard  in  the  land.  The  excursionist  is  more  in- 
dustrious than  even  the  Colorado  beetle.  Some- 
thing happens  every  day,  to  interest  and  amuse 
everybody.     Apart  from  the  gay  incidents  of  the 


The  Beauty  of  England.  25 

season,  however,  there  is  so  much  else  to  be  seen 
in  London  that  the  pilgrim  scarcely  knows  where 
to  choose,  and  certainly  is  perplexed  by  what  Dr. 
Johnson  called  "  the  multiplicity  of  agreeable  con- 
sciousness." One  spot,  to  which  I  have  many 
times  been  drawn,  and  which  the  mention  of  Dr. 
Johnson  instantly  calls  to  mind,  is  the  wonderously 
impressive  place  in  Westminster  Abbey,  where 
that  great  man's  ashes  are  buried.  Side  by  side, 
under  the  pavement  of  the  Abbey,  within  a  few 
feet  of  earth,  sleep  Johnson,  Garrick,  Sheridan, 
Henderson,  Dickens,  Cumberland,  and  Handel. 
Garrick's  wife  is  buried  in  the  same  grave  with 
her  husband.  Close  by,  some  brass  letters  on  a 
little  slab  in  the  pavement  disclose  the  last  resting- 
place  of  Thomas  Campbell.  Not  far  off  is  the 
body  of  JNIacaulay  ;  while  many  a  stroller  through 
the  nave  treads  upon  the  grave-stone  of  that 
astonishing  old  man,  Thomas  Parr,  who  lived  in 
the  reigns  of  nine  princes  (14S3-1635),  and 
reached  the  great  age  of  152.  All  parts  of  West- 
minster Abbey  impress  the  reverential  mind.  It 
is  an  experience  very  strange  and  full  of  awe, 
for  instance,  suddenly  to  find  your  steps  upon  the 
sepulchres  of  such  illustrious  men  as  Burke,  Pitt, 
Fox,  and  Grattan  ;  and  you  come,  with  a  thrill  of 
more  than  surprise,  upon  such  still  fresh  anti- 
quity as  the  grave  of  the  hapless  Anne  Neville,  who 
was  the  daughter  of  Warwick  and  the  (2ueen  of 
Richard  the  Third.    But  no  single  spot  in  the  great 


26  The  Trip  to  England. 

cathedral  can  so  enthrall  the  imagination  as 
that  strip  of  storied  stone  beneath  which  Garrick, 
Johnson,  Sheridan,  Dickens,  Macaulay,  and  Han- 
del sleep,  side  by  side.  This  writer,  when  lately 
he  visited  the  Abbey,  found  a  chair  upon  the 
grave  of  Johnson,  and  sat  down  there  to  rest 
and  muse.  The  letters  on  the  stone  are  fast 
wearing  away ;  but  the  memory  of  this  sturdy 
champion  of  thought  can  never  perish,  as  long 
as  the  votaries  of  literature  love  their  art,  and 
honour  the  valiant  genius  which  battled  —  through 
hunger,  toil,  and  contumely  —  for  its  dignity  and 
renown.  It  was  a  tender  and  right  feeling  wliich 
prompted  the  burial  of  Johnson  close  beside- 
Garrick.  They  set  out  together  to  seek  their 
fortunes  in  the  great  city.  They  went  through 
privation  and  trial  liand  in  hand.  Each  found 
glory  in  a  different  way  ;  and,  although  parted 
afterward  by  the  currents  of  fame  and  wealth,  they 
were  never  sundered  in  affection.  It  was  fit  they 
should  at  last  find  their  rest  together,  under  the 
most  glorious  roof  that  greets  the  skies  of  England. 
Fortune  gave  me  a  good  first  day  at  the  Tower 
of  London.  The  sky  lowered.  The  air  was  very 
cold.  The  wind  blew  witli  angry  gusts.  The  rain 
fell,  now  and  then,  in  a  chill  drizzle.  The  river  was 
dark  and  sullen.  If  tlie  spirits  of  the  dead  come 
back  to  haunt  any  place,  they  surely  come  back 
to  haunt  this  one  ;  and  this  was  a  day  for  their 
presence.     One  dark  ghost  seemed  near,  at  every 


T/ic  Beauty  of  England.  27 

step  —  the  baleful  shade  of  the  grim  Duke  of  Glos- 
ter.  The  little  room  in  which  the  princes  are  said 
to  have  been  murdered,  by  his  command,  was  shown, 
and  the  oratory  where  King  Henry  the  Sixth  is 
supposed  to  have  met  his  bloody  death,  and  the 
council  chamber  in  wliich  Richard  —  after  listen- 
insf,  in  an  ambush  behind  the  arras — denounced 
the  wretched  Hastings.  Tliis  latter  place  is  now 
used  as  an  armoury  ;  but  the  same  ceiling  covers  it 
which  echoed  the  bitter  invective  of  Gloster,  and 
the  rude  clamour  of  his  soldiers,  when  their  fright- 
ened victim  was  plucked  forth  and  dragged  down 
stairs,  to  be  beheaded  on  a  stick  of  wood  in  the 
court-yard.  The  Tower  is  a  place  for  such  deeds, 
and  you  almost  wonder  that  they  do  not  happen 
still,  in  its  gloomy  chambers.  The  room  in  wiiich 
the  princes  were  killed  is  particularly  murderous 
in  aspect.  It  is  an  inner  room,  small  and  dark. 
A  barred  window  in  one  of  its  walls  fronts  a 
window  on  the  other  side  of  the  passage  by  which 
you  approach  it.  This  window  is  but  a  few  feet 
f'rom  the  floor,  and  perhaps  tlic  murderers  paused 
to  look  through  it,  as  they  went  to  their  hellish 
work  upon  the  poor  children  of  King  Edward. 
The  entrance  was  pointed  out  to  a  secret  passage 
by  which  this  apartment  could  be  approached  from 
the  foot  of  the  Tower.  In  one  gloomy  stone 
chamber  the  crown  jewels  are  exhibited,  in  a  large 
glass  case.  There  is  a  crown  here,  of  velvet  and 
gold,    which    was    made   for  poor   Anne    Boleyn. 


28  The  Trip  to  England. 

You  may  pass  across  the  court-yard  and  pause  on 
the  spot  where  this  miserable  woman  was  beheaded, 
and  you  may  walk  thence  over  the  ground  that 
her  last  trembling  footsteps  traversed,  to  the  round 
tower  in  which,  at  the  last,  she  lived.  Her  grave 
is  in  the  chancel  of  a  little  antique  church,  close 
by.  I  saw  the  cell  of  Raleigh,  and  that  direful 
chamber  which  is  scrawled  ail  over  with  the  names 
and  emblems  of  prisoners  who  therein  suffered 
confinement  and  lingering  agony,  nearly  always 
ending  in  death  ;  but  I  saw  no  sadder  place  than 
Anne  Boleyn's  tower.  It  seemed  in  the  strangest 
way  eloquent  of  mute  suffering.  It  seemed  to 
exhale  grief  and  to  plead  for  love  and  pity.  Yet  — 
what  woman  ever  had  greater  love  than  was  lavished 
on  her !  And  what  woman  ever  trampled  more 
royally  and  wickedly  upon  human  hearts  !  It  was 
to  Anne  Boleyn  that  Sir  Thomas  Wyatt  addressed 
those  passionate  lines  —  so  fraught  with  her  own 
character  as  well  as  her  lover's  idolatry!  —  which, 
once  read,  can  never  be  forgotten  : 

"  Forget  not  yet  the  tried  intent 
Of  such  a  truth  as  I  have  meant ; 
My  great  travail  so  gladly  spent 
Forget  not  yet ! 

"  Forget  not  yet  when  first  began 
The  weary  life,  ye  know  since  when  ; 
The  suit,  the  service,  none  tell  can, 
Forget  not  yet ! 


The  Beauty  of  England.  29 

«'  Forget  not  yet  the  great  assays ; 
The  cruel  wrong,  the  scornful  ways, 
The  painful  patience  in  delays, 
Forget  not  yet ! 


«  Forget  not,  oh,  forget  not  this  ! 
How  long  ago  hath  been,  and  is, 
The  mind  that  never  meant  amiss, 
Forget  not  yet ! 

"  Forget  not  then  thine  own  approved, 
The  which  so  long  hath  thee  so  loved. 
Whose  steadfast  faith  yet  never  moved, 
Forget  not  this ! " 


III. 


RAMBLES    IN    LONDON. 


A  LL  old  cities  get  rich  in  association,  as  a  matter 
■^^  of  course,  and  whetlier  they  will  or  no ;  but 
London,  by  reason  of  its  great  extent,  as  well  as  its 
great  antiquity,  is  richer  in  association  than  any  mod- 
ern place  on  earth.  The  stranger  scarcely  takes  a 
step  without  encountering  some  new  object  of  inter- 
est. The  walk  along  the  Strand  and  Fleet  street,  in 
particular,  is  continually  on  storied  ground.  Old 
Temple  Bar  still  stands  (July,  1877),  though  "totter- 
ing to  its  fall,"  and  marks  the  boundary  between  the 
two  streets.  The  statues  of  Charles  the  First  and 
Charles  the  Second  on  its  western  front,  would  be  re- 
markable anywhere,  as  characteristic  portraits.  You 
stand  beside  this  arch  and  quite  forget  the  passing 


Rambles  in  London.  31 

tlironj;,  and  take  no  heed  of  the  tumult  around,  as 
you  think  of  Johnson  and  Boswell,  leaning  against 
this  wall,  after  midnight,  in  the  far-off  times,  and 
waking  the  echoes  of  the  Temple  Garden  with  their 
frolicsome  laughter.  The  Bar  is  carefully  propped 
now,  and  they  will  nurse  its  age  as  long  as  they 
can;  but  it  is  an  obstruction  to  travel  —  as  much 
so  as  a  wall  with  jrates  in  it  would  be  across  Broad- 
way  —  and  it  must  come  down.  (It  was  removed 
in  the  summer  of  1878.)  They  will,  probably,  set  it 
up,  newly  built,  in  another  place.  Nothing  is  rashly 
destroyed  in  England.  They  have  even  loft  un- 
touched a  little  piece  of  the  original  scaffolding 
built  around  St.  Pauls  ;  and  this  fragment  of  decay- 
ing wood  may  still  be  seen,  wedged  between  two 
pilasters,  high  upon  the  side  of  the  cathedral.  The 
Rainbow,  the  Mitre,  the  Cheshire  Cheese,  Dolly's 
Chop- House,  and  the  Round  Table  —  all  taverns  or 
public-houses  tiiat  were  frequented  by  the  old  wits  — 
are  still  extant.  The  Cheshire  Cheese  is  scarcely 
changed  from  what  it  was  when  Johnson,  Gold- 
smith, and  their  comrades  ate  beefsteak  pie  and 
drank  porter  there,  and  the  Doctor  "  tossed  and 
gored  several  persons,"'  as  it  w'as  his  cheerful  cus- 
tom to  do.  The  benches  in  that  room  are  as  un- 
comfortable as  thev  well  could  be  ;  mere  led<res  of 
well-worn  wood,  on  which  tiie  visitor  sits  bolt  up- 
right, in  difficult  dignity  ;  but  there  is,  probably, 
nothing  on  earth  that  would  induce  the  owner  to 
alter  them  — and  he  is  quite  right.     The  conserva- 


32  The  Trip  to  England. 

tive  principle  in  the  English  mind,  if  it  has  saved 
some  trash,  has  saved  more  treasure.  At  tlie  foot  of 
Buckingham  street,  a  little  off  the  Strand,  — where 
was  situated  an  estate  of  George  Villiers,  first  Duke 
of  Buckingham,  who  was  assassinated  in  1628,  and 
whose  tomb  may  be  seen  in  Henry  the  Seventh's 
chapel,  in  Westminster  Abbey,  —  still  stands  the 
slowly  crumbling  ruin  of  the  old  Water  Gate,  so 
often  mentioned  as  the  spot  where  accused  traitors 
were  embarked  for  the  Tower.  The  river,  in  former 
times,  flowed  up  to  this,  but  the  land  along  the 
margin  of  the  Thames  has  been  redeemed,  in  our 
day,  and  the  magnificent  Victoria  and  Albert  Em- 
bankments now  hem  in  the  river  for  a  long  distance 
on  both  sides.  The  Water  Gate,  in  fact,  stands  in 
a  little  park  on  the  north  bank  of  the  Thames.  Not 
far  away  is  the  Adelphi  Terrace,  where  Garrick 
lived  and  died  [obt.  January  20th,  1779,  aged  sixty- 
three],  and  where,  in  1822,  his  widow  expired,  at  a 
great  age.  The  house  of  Garrick  is  let  in  "cham- 
bers" now.  If  you  walk  up  the  Strand  toward 
Charing  Cross,  you  presently  come  near  to  the 
Churcii  of  St.  Martin's-in-the-Fields,  which  is  one 
of  the  best  works  of  Sir  Christopher  Wren.  The 
fogs  have  stained  this  building  with  such  a  deftly 
artistic  touch  that  its  appearance  has  all  the  charm 
of  a  lovely  stereoscopic  view.  Nell  Gwyn's  name 
is  connected  with  St.  Martin's.  She  used  to  wor- 
ship there,  and  she  left  an  incessant  legacy  to  the 
ringers  of  the  bell ;    and  at  stated  times,  to  this 


Rambles  in  London.  2>7i 

day,   they  ring  it  for  '-'poor  Nelly's"  sake.      Her 
funeral  occurred  in  this  church,  and  was  very  pom- 
pous, and  no  less  a  person  than  Tennison  (after- 
wards   Archbishop    of    Canterbury)    preached    the 
funeral    sermon.      That   prelate's  dust  reposes  in 
Lambeth  Church,  which   can  be  seen,  acro.ss  the 
river,  from  this  part  of  Westminster.     If  you  walk 
down  the  Strand,  througli  Temple  Bar,  you  presently 
reach  the  Temple :  and  there  is  no  place  in  London 
where  the  past  and  the  present  are  so  strangely  con- 
fronted as  they  are  here.     The  venerable  church, 
so  quaint  with  its  cone-pointed  turrets,  was  sleep- 
ing in  the  sunshine  when  first  I  saw  it;  sparrows 
were  twittering  around  its    spires,  and   gliding  in 
and  out  of  the  crevices  in  its  ancient  walls  ;  while 
from  within  a  strain  of  organ  music,  low  and  sweet, 
trembled  forth,  till  the  air  became  a  benediction, 
and  every  common  thought  and  feeling  was  chas- 
tened away  from  mind  and  heart.     The  grave  of 
Goldsmith  is  close  to  the  pathway  that  runs  beside 
this  church,  on  a  terrace  raised  above  the  founda- 
tion of  the  building,  and  above  the  little  grave-yard 
of  the  Templars,  that  nestles  at  its  base.    As  I  stood 
beside  the  resting-place  of  that  sweet  poet,  it  was 
impossible  not   to    feel    both   grieved    and  glad  — 
grieved  at  the  thought  of  all  he  suffered,  and  of  all 
that  the  poetic  nature  must  always  suffer  before  it 
will  give   forth   its  immortal   music    for  mankind  : 
glad  that  his  gentle  spirit  found  rest  at  last,  and 
that  time  has  given  him  the  glory  he  would  most 


34  The  Trip  to  Eii gland. 

have  prized  —  the  affection  of  all  true  hearts.  A 
grey  stone,  coffin-shaped,  and  marked  with  across, — 
after  the  fashion  of  the  contiguous  tombs  of  the 
Templars,  —  is  imposed  upon  his  grave.  One  sur- 
face bears  the  inscription,  "  Here  lies  Oliver  Gold- 
smith;" the  other  presents  the  dates  of  his  birth 
and  death.  I  tried  to  call  up  the  scene  of  his  burial, 
when,  around  the  open  grave,  on  that  tearful  April 
evening,  Johnson,  Burke,  Reynolds,  Beauclerc, 
Boswell,  Davies,  Kelly,  Palmer,  and  the  rest  of  that 
broken  circle,  may  have  gathered  to  witness 

"  The  duties  by  the  lawn-robed  prelate  paid, 
And  the  last  rites  that  dust  to  dust  conveyed." 

No  place  could  be  less  romantic  than  Southwark 
is  now  ;  but  there  are  few  places  in  England  that 
possess  a  greater  charm  for  the  literary  pilgrim. 
Shakespeare  lived  there,  and  it  was  there  that  he 
managed  his  theatre  and  made  his  fortune.  Old 
London  Bridge  spanned  the  Thames,  at  this  point, 
in  those  days,  and  was  the  only  road  to  the  Surrey 
side  of  the  river.  The  theatre  stood  near  the  end 
of  the  bridge,  and  was  thus  easy  of  access  to  the 
wits  and  beaux  of  London.  No  trace  of  it  now  re- 
mains; but  a  public-house  called  the  "Globe"  — 
which  was  its  name  —  is  standing  there;  and  the 
old  church  of  St.  Saviour's  —  into  which  Shakes- 
peare must  often  have  entered  —  still  braves  the 
storms,  and  still  resists  the  encroachments  of  time 
and    change.      In    Shakespeare's   day   there   were 


Rambles  in  London.  35 

houses  on  each  side  of  London  Bridse  ;  and,  as  lie 
walked  on  the  bank  of  tlie  Thames,  he  could  look 
across  to  the  tower,  and  to  Baynard  Castle,  which 
had  been  the  residence  of  Richard,  Duke  of  Glos- 
ter,  and  could  see,  uplifted  high  in  air,  the  spire  of 
Old  St.  P^aul's.  The  borough  of  Southwark  was 
then  but  thinly  peopled.  Many  of  its  houses,  as 
may  be  seen  in  an  old  picture  of  the  city,  were  sur- 
rounded by  fields  or  gardens ;  and  life  to  its  inhabit- 
ants must  have  been  comparatively  rural.  Now,  it 
is  packed  with  buildings,  gridironed  with  railways, 
crowded  with  people,  and  to  the  last  degree  resO' 
nant  and  feverish  with  action  and  effort.  Life 
swarms,  traffic  bustles,  and  travel  thunders,  all 
round  the  cradle  of  the  British  drama.  The  old 
church  of  St.  Saviour's  alone  preserves  the  sacred 
memory  of  the  past.  I  made  a  pilgrimage  to 
this  shrine,  in  the  company  of  one  of  the  kindliest 
humorists  in  England.  We  took  boat  at  West- 
minster Bridge,  and  landed  close  by  the  church  in 
Southwark,  and  we  were  so  fortunate  as  to  get  per- 
mission to  enter  the  church  without  a  guide.  The 
oldest  part  of  it  is  the  Lady  Chapel  —  a  wing  which, 
in  English  cathedrals,  is  placed  behind  the  choir. 
Through  this  we  strolled,  alone  and  in  silence. 
Every  footstep  there  falls  upon  a  grave.  The  pave- 
ment is  one  mass  of  grave-stones  ;  and  through  the 
lofty,  stained  windows  of  the  chapel  a  solemn  light 
pours  in  upon  the  sculptured  names  of  men  and 
women  who  have  lon^r  been  dust.     In  one  corner  is 


36  The  Trip  to  England. 

an  ancient  stone  coffin  —  a  relic  of  the  Roman  days 
of  Britain.  This  is  the  room  in  which  Stephen 
Gardiner — Bishop  of  Winchester,  in  the  days  of 
cruel  Queen  Mary  —  held  his  ecclesiastical  court, 
and  condemned  many  a  dissentient  devotee  to  tlie 
rack  and  the  faggot:  in  this  very  room  he  had  him- 
self been  put  to  trial,  in  his  hour  of  misfortune. 
Both  Mary  and  Elizabeth  must  often  have  entered 
this  chapel.  But  it  is  in  the  choir,  hard  by,  that 
the  pilgrim  pauses  with  most  of  reverence;  for  here, 
not  far  from  the  altar,  he  stands  upon  the  graves  of 
Edmund  Shakespeare,  John  Fletcher,  and  Phillip 
Massinger.  Tliey  rest  almost  side  by  side,  and 
only  their  names  and  the  dates  of  their  death  are 
cut  in  the  tablets  that  mark  their  sepulchres.  Ed- 
mund Shakespeare,  the  younger  brother  of  William, 
was  an  actor  in  his  company,  and  died  in  1607,  aged 
twenty-seven.  The  great  poet  must  have  stood  at 
this  grave,  and  suffered  and  wept  here  ;  and  some- 
how the  lover  of  Shakespeare  comes  very  near  to 
the  heart  of  the  master,  when  he  stands  in  this  place. 
Massinger  was  buried  there,  March  18,  1638, — 
the  parish  register  recording  him  as  "a  stranger." 
Fletcher  —  of  the  Beaumont  and  Fletcher  brother- 
hood—  was  buried  there,  in  1625  :  Beaumont's  grave 
is  in  the  Abbey.  The  dust  of  Henslowe,  the  man- 
ager, also  rests  beneath  the  jDavement  of  St.  Sav- 
iour's. In  the  north  transept  of  the  church  is  the 
tomb  of  John  Gower,  the  old  poet  —  whose  effigy, 
carved  and  painted,  reclines  upon  it,  and  is  not 


Rambles  in  London.  37 

pleasant  to  beliokl.  A  formal,  uncomely,  severe  as- 
pect he  must  have  h:^d,  if  he  resembled  tliis  image. 
The  tomb  has  been  moved  from  the  spot  where  it 
first  stood  —  a  proceeding  made  necessary  by  a  fire 
that  destroyed  part  of  the  old  church.  It  is  said  that 
Gower  caused  this  tomb  to  be  erected  during  his 
life-time,  so  that  it  might  be  in  readiness  to  receive 
his  bones.  The  bones  are  lost,  but  the  memorial 
remains  —  sacred  to  the  memory  of  the  father  of 
English  song.  This  tomb  was  restored  by  the 
Uuke  of  Sutherland,  in  1830.  It  is  enclosed  by  a 
little  fence  made  of  iron  spears,  painted  brown  and 
gilded  at  their  points.  1  went  into  the  new  part  of 
tlie  church,  and,  quite  alone,  knelt  in  one  of  the 
pews,  and  long  remained  there,  overcome  with 
thoughts  of  the  past,  and  of  the  transient,  moment- 
ary nature  of  this  our  earthly  life  and  the  shadows 
that  we  pursue. 

One  object  of  merriment  attracts  a  passing 
glance  in  Southwark  Church.  There  is  a  tomb  in 
a  corner  of  it,  that  commemorates  an  ancient 
maker  of  patent  medicine  —  an  elaborate  struct- 
ure, with  the  deceased  cut  in  effigy,  and  with 
a  long  and  sonorous  epitaph  on  the  pedestal. 
These  are  two  of  the  lines  : 

"  His  virtues  and  bis  Pills  are  so  well  known, 
That  envy  can"t  confine  them  under  stone." 

Shakespeare  once  lived  in  Clink  street,  in  the 
borough  of  Southwark.     Goldsmith  practised  medi- 


38  The  Trip  to  England. 

cine  there,  for  a  while.  Chaucer  came  there,  with 
his  Canterbury  Pilgrims,  and  stopped  at  the  Tab- 
ard Inn.  It  must  have  been  a  romantic  region,  in 
the  old  times  ;  but  it  bears  now  the  same  relation 
to  London  that  Brooklyn  bears  to  New-York  —  ex- 
cept that  it  is  more  populous,  active,  and  noisy. 


rv. 


A  VISIT  TO  WINDSOR. 


TF  the  beauty  of  England  were  merely  sirper- 
-'-  ficial  it  would  produce  a  merely  superficial 
effect.  It  would  cause  a  passing  pleasure,  and 
would  be  forgotten.  It  certainly  would  not  —  as 
now  in  fact  it  does  —  inspire  a  deep,  joyous,  serene 
and  grateful  contentment,  and  linger  in  the  mind, 
a  gracious  and  beneficent  remembrance.  The  con- 
quering and  lasting  potency  of  it  resides  not 
alone  in  loveliness  of  expression,  but  in  loveliness 
of  character.  Having  first  greatly  blessed  the 
British  Islands  with  the  natural  advantages  of 
position,  climate,  soil,  and  products,  nature  has 
wrought  out  their  development  and  adornment  as 
a  necessary  consequence  of  the  spirit  of  their 
inhabitants.     The  picturesque  variety  and  pastoral 


40  The  Trip  to  England. 

repose  of  the  English  landscape  spring,  in  a  con- 
siderable measure,  from  the  imaginative  taste  and 
the  affectionate  gentleness  of  the  English  people. 
The  state  of  the  country,  like  its  social  constitu- 
tion, flows  from  principles  within  (which  are  con- 
stantly suggested),  and  it  steadily  comforts  and 
nourishes  the  mind  with  a  sense  of  kindly  feeling, 
moral  rectitude,  solidity,  and  permanence.  Thus 
in  the  peculiar  beauty  of  England  the  ideal  is 
made  the  actual  —  is  expressed  in  things  more 
than  in  words  ;  and  in  things  by  which  words  are 
transcended.  Milton's  "  L' Allegro,''  fine  as  it  is, 
is  not  so  fine  as  the  scenery  —  the  crystallized,  em- 
bodied poetry  —  out  of  which  it  arose.  All  the 
delicious  rural  verse  that  has  been  written  in  Eng- 
land is  only  the  excess  and  superflux  of  her  own 
poetic  opulence  ;  it  has  rippled  from  the  hearts 
of  her  poets  just  as  the  fragrance  floats  away 
from  her  hawthorn  hedges.  At  every  step  of  his 
progress  the  pilgrim  through  English  scenes  is 
impressed  with  this  sovereign  excellence  of  the 
accomplished  fact,  as  contrasted  with  any  words 
that  can  be  said  in  its  celebration. 

Among  representative  scenes  which  are  eloquent 
with  this  instructive  meaning, — scenes  easily  and 
pleasurably  accessible  to  the  traveller,  in  what 
Dickens  expressively  called  "the  green,  English 
summer  weather,"  —  is  the  region  of  Windsor. 
The  chief  features  of  it  have  often  been  described; 
the  charm  that  it  exercises  can  only  be  suggested. 


A  Visit  to  U'iniisor.  41 

To  see  Windsor,  moreover,  is  to  compreliend,  as 
at  a  jilance,  the  old  feudal  system,  and  to  feel,  in 
a  profound  and  special  way,  the  pomp  of  En,£;lish 
character  and  history.  More  than  this  :  It  is  to 
rise  to  that  ennobling  exaltation  which  always 
accompanies  broad,  retrospective  contemplation  of 
the  current  of  human  aflfairs.  In  this  quaint,  dec- 
orous town — nestled  at  the  base  of  that  mighty 
and  magnificent  castle  which  has  been  the  home 
of  princes  for  more  than  five  hundred  years  —  the 
imaginative  mind  wanders  over  vast  tracts  of  the 
past,  and  beholds,  as  in  a  mirror,  the  pageants 
of  chivalry,  the  coronations  of  kings,  the  strifes 
of  sects,  the  battles  of  armies,  the  schemes  of 
statesmen,  the  decay  of  transient  systems,  the 
growth  of  a  rational  civilization,  and  the  everlast- 
ing march  of  thought.  Every  prospect  of  the 
region  intensifies  this  sentiment  of  contemplative 
grandeur.  As  you  look  from  the  castle  walls 
your  gaze  takes  in  miles  and  miles  of  blooming 
country,  sprinkled  over  with  little  hamlets,  wherein 
the  utmost  stateliness  of  learning  and  rank  is 
gracefully  commingled  with  all  that  is  lovely  and 
soothing  in  rural  life.  Not  far  away  rise  the 
"antique  towers"  of  Eton  — 

"  Where  grateful  Science  still  adores 
Her  Henry's  holy  shade." 

It  was  in  Windsor  Castle  that  lier  Henry  was 
horn ;  and    there   he   often  held  his  court ;  and  it 


42  The  Trip  to  England. 

is  in  St.  George's  Chapel  that  his  reHcs  repose.  In 
the  dim  distance  stands  the  church  of  Stoke-Pogis, 
about  which  Gray  was  wont  to  wander, 

"  Beneath  those  rugged  elms,  that  yew-tree's  shade."    , 

You  recognize  now  a  deeper  significance  than  ever 
before  in  the  "solemn  stillness"  of  the  incom- 
parable Elegy.  The  luminous  twilight  mood  of  that 
immortal  poem  —  its  pensive  reverie  and  solemn 
passion  —  is  inherent  in  the  scene;  and  you  feel 
that  it  was  there,  and  there  only,  that  the  genius 
of  its  exceptional  author — austerely  gentle  and 
severely  pure,  and  thus  in  perfect  harmony  with 
its  surroundings  —  could  have  been  moved  to  that 
sublime  outburst  of  inspiration  and  eloquence. 
Near  at  hand,  in  the  midst  of  your  reverie,  the 
mellow  organ  sounds  from  the  chapel  of  St. 
George,  where,  under  "  fretted  vault "  and  over 
"  long-drawn  aisle,"  depend  the  ghostly,  mould- 
ering banners  of  ancient  knights  —  as  still  as  the 
bones  of  the  dead-and-gone  monarchs  that  crumble 
in  the  crypt  below.  In  this  church  are  many  of  the 
old  kings  and  nobles  of  England.  The  handsome 
and  gallant  Edward  the  Fourth  here  found  his 
grave ;  and  near  it  is  that  of  the  accomplished  Hast- 
ings — his  faithful  friend,  to  the  last  and  after.  Here 
lies  the  dust  of  the  stalwart,  impetuous,  and  savage 
Henry  the  Eighth,  and  here  the  ill-starred  and 
hapless  Queen  Caroline;  and  here,  at  midnight, 
by   the   light   of    torches,    they   laid    beneath   the 


A  Visii  to  IVindsor.  43 

pavement  tlic  man.!;led  body  of  Charles  the  First. 
As  you  stand  on  Windsor  ramparts,  pondering 
thus  upon  the  storied  past  and  the  evanescence  of 
"all  that  beauty,  all  that  wealth  e'er  gave,"  your 
eyes  rest  dreamily  on  green  fields  far  below, 
through  which,  under  tall  elms,  the  brimming  and 
sparkling  river  flows  on  without  a  sound,  and  in 
which  a  few  figures,  dwarfed  by  distance,  flit  here 
and  there,  in  seeming  aimless  idleness  ;  while, 
warned  homeward  by  impending  sunset,  the  chat- 
tering birds  circle  and  float  around  the  lofty 
towers  of  the  castle;  and  delicate  perfumes  of 
seringa  and  jasmine  are  wafted  up  from  dusky, 
unknown  depths  at  the  base  of  its  ivied  steep. 
At  sucii  an  hour  1  stood  on  those  ramparts,  and 
saw  the  shy  villages  and  rich  meadows  of  fertile 
Berkshire,  all  red  and  golden  with  sunset  light; 
and  at  such  an  hour  I  stood  in  the  lonely  cloisters 
of  St.  George's  Chapel,  and  heard  the  distant 
organ  sob,  and  saw  the  sunlight  lade  up  the  grey 
walls,  and  felt  and  knew  the  sanctity  of  silence. 
Ao-e  and  death  have  made  this  church  illustrious  ; 
but  the  spot  itself  has  its  own  innate  charm  of 
mystical  repose. " 

"  No  use  of  lanthorns  ;  and  in  one  place  lay 
Feathers  and  dust  to-day  and  yesterday." 

The  drive  from  the  front  of  Windsor  Castle 
is  through  a  broad  and  stately  avenue,  three  miles 
in   length,   straight   as   an   arrow   and    level   as    a 


44  The  Trip  to  England, 

standing  pool  ;  and  this  white  highway  through 
the  green  and  fragrant  sod  is  sumptuously  em- 
bowered, from  end  to  end,  with  double  rows  of 
magnificent  old  elms.  The  Windsor  avenue, 
like  the  splendid  chestnut  grove  at  Busliy  Park, 
long  famous  among  the  pageants  of  rural  Eng- 
land, has  often  been  described.  It  is  after  leav- 
ing this  that  the  rambler  comes  upon  the  rarer 
beauties  of  Windsor  Park  and  Forest.  From 
the  far  end  of  the  avenue,  — where,  in  a  superb 
position,  the  equestrian  statue  of  King  George 
rises  on  its  massive  pedestal  of  natural  rock, — 
the  road  winds  away,  through  shaded  dell  and 
verdant  glade,  past  great  gnarled  beeches  and 
under  boughs  of  elm,  and  yew,  and  oak,  till 
its  silver  thread  is  lost  in  the  distant  woods. 
At  intervals  a  branching  path-way  strays  off  to 
some  secluded  lodge,  half  hidden  in  foliage  —  the 
property  of  the  Crown,  and  the  rustic  residence  of 
a  scion  of  the  royal  race.  In  one  of  these  retreats 
dwelt  poor  old  George  the  Third,  in  the  days  of 
his  mental  darkness ;  and  the  memory  of  the 
agonizing  king  seems  still  to  cast  a  shadow  on  the 
mysterious  and  melancholy  house.  They  show 
you,  under  glass,  in  one  of  the  lodge  gardens,  an 
enormous  grape-vine,  owned  by  the  Queen  —  a 
vine  which,  from  its  single  stalwart  trunk,  spreads 
its  teeming  branches,  laterally,  at  least  two  hun- 
dred feet  in  each  direction.  So  come  use  and 
thrift,    hand   in    hand   with    romance  !      Many   an 


A    Visit  to    Windsor.  45 

aged  oak  is  passed,  in  your  progress,  round  wliicli, 
"at  still  midnight,"  Hcrne  the  Hunter  might  still 
take  his  ghostly  prowl,  shaking  his  chain  "  in  a 
most  hideous  and  dreadful  manner."  The  wreck  of 
the  veritable  Heme's  Oak,  it  is  said,  was  rooted 
out,  together  with  other  ancient  and  decayed 
trees,  in  the  time  of  George  the  Third,  and  in 
somewhat  too  literal  fulfilment  of  his  Majesty's 
misinterpreted  command.  This  great  park  is  four- 
teen miles  in  circumference,  and  contains  nearly 
four  thousand  acres  ;  and  many  of  the  youngest 
trees  that  adorn  it  are  more  than  one  hundred 
and  fifty  years  old.  Far  in  its  heart  you  stroll 
by  Virginia  Water  —  an  artificial  lake,  but  fault- 
less in  its  quiet  beauty  —  and  perceive  it  so  deep 
and  so  breezy  that  a  full-rigged  ship-of-war,  with 
heavy  armament,  can  navigate  its  wind-swept, 
curling  billows.  In  the  dim  groves  that  fringe 
its  margin  are  many  nests  wherein  pheasants 
are  bred,  to  fall  by  the  royal  shot  and  to  supply 
the  royal  tables  :  these  you  may  contemplate,  but 
not  approach.  At  a  point  in  your  walk,  seques- 
tered and  lonely,  they  have  set  up  and  skilfully 
disposed  the  fragments  of  a  genuine  ruined  tem- 
ple, brought  from  the  remote  East  —  relic,  per- 
chance, of  ''Tadmor's  marble  waste,"  and  certainly 
a  most  solemn  memorial  of  the  morning  twi- 
light of  time.  Broken  arch,  storm-stained  pillar, 
and  shattered  column  are  here  shrouded  with 
moss   and   ivy ;    and    should    you   chance    to    see 


46  The  Trip  to  England. 

them  as  the  evening  shadows  deepen  and  the 
evening  wind  sighs  mournfully  in  the  grass,  your 
fancy  will  not  fail  to  drink  in  the  perfect  illusion 
that  one  of  the  stateliest  structures  of  antiquity 
has  slowly  crumbled  where  now  its  fragments 
remain. 

Quaint  is  a  descriptive  epithet  that  has  been 
much  abused  ;  but  it  may,  with  absolute  pro- 
priety, be  applied  to  Windsor.  The  devious  little 
streets  there  visible,  and  the  carved  and  timber- 
crossed  buildings,  often  of  great  age,  are  uncom- 
monly rich  in  the  expressiveness  of  imaginative 
character.  The  emotions  and  the  fancy,  equally 
with  the  sense  of  necessity  and  the  instinct  of  use, 
have  exercised  their  influence  and  uttered  their 
spirit  in  the  shaping  and  adornment  of  the  town. 
While  it  constantly  feeds  the  eye  —  with  that 
pleasing  irregularity  of  lines  and  forms  which  is  so 
delicious  and  refreshing  —  it  quite  as  constantly 
nurtures  the  sense  of  romance  which  ought  to  play 
so  large  a  part  in  all  our  lives,  redeeming  us  from 
the  tyranny  of  the  commonplace  and  intensifying 
all  the  high  feelings  and  noble  aspirations  that 
are  possible  to  human  nature.  England  contains 
many  places  like  Windsor;  some  that  blend,  in 
even  richer  amplitude,  the  elements  of  quaint- 
ness,  loveliness,  and  magnificence.  The  meaning 
of  them  all,  as  it  seemed  to  me,  is  the  same  :  that 
romance,  beauty,  and  gentleness  are  not  effete, 
but  forever  vital  ;  that  their  forces  are  within  our 


A    Visit  fo    IVindsor.  47 

own  souls,  and  ready  and  ea-^er  to  find  their  way 
into  all  our  thoughts,  actions,  and  circumstances, 
and  to  brighten  for  every  one  of  us  the  face  of 
every  day  ;  tliat  they  ought  neither  to  be  relegated 
to  the  distant  and  the  past,  nor  kept  for  our  books 
and  day-dreams  alone;  but — in  a  calmer  and 
higher  mood  than  is  usual  in  this  age  of  universal 
mediocrity,  critical  scepticism,  and  miscellaneous 
tumult  —  should  be  permitted  to  flow  out  into  our 
architecture,  adornments,  and  customs,  to  hallow 
and  preserve  our  antiquities,  to  soften  our  manners, 
to  give  us  tranquillity,  patience,  and  tolerance,  to 
make  our  country  loveable  for  our  own  hearts,  and 
so  to  enable  us  to  bequeath  it,  sure  of  love  and 
reverence,  to  succeeding  ages. 


I 


V. 


THE   PALACE    OF   WESTMINSTER. 


^  I  "'HE  American  who,  having  been  a  careful 
and  interested  reader  of  English  historj', 
visits  London  for  the  first  time,  naturally  expects 
to  find  the  ancient  city  in  a  state  of  mild  decay  : 
and  he  is,  consequently,  a  little  startled  at  first, 
upon  realizing  that  the  Present  is  quite  as  vital  as 
ever  the  Past  was,  and  that  London  antiquity  is, 
in  fact,  swathed  in  the  robes  of  every-day  action, 
and  very  much  alive.  When,  for  example,  you  enter 
Westminster  Hall — "the  great  hall  of  William 
Ruf  us  "  —  you  are  beneath  one  of  the  most  glori- 
ous canopies  in  the  world  —  one  which  was  built 
by  Richard  the  Second,  whose  grave,  chosen  by 
himself,  is   in  the   Abbey,  just   across    the  street 


^ 


n 


m 


^3 


. '•.  t1 


.:j^'^^- 


TJie  Palace  of  IVtstminstcr.  49 

from  where  you  stand.  I)ut  tliis  old  Iiall  Is  now 
only  a  vestibule  to  the  Palace  of  Westminster.  'Ilie 
Lords  and  the  Commons  of  England,  on  thuir  way 
to  the  Houses  of  Parliament,  pass  every  day  over 
the  spot  on  which  Charles  the  First  was  tried 
anil  condemned,  and  on  which  occurred  tiie  trial 
of  Warren  Hastings.  It  is  a  mere  thoroughfare 
—  glorious  though  it  be,  alike  in  structure  and 
historic  renown.  The  Palace  Yard,  near  by,  was 
the  scene  of  the  execution  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh ; 
but  all  that  now  marks  the  spot  is  a  rank  of  cabs 
and  a  shelter  for  cab-drivers.  In  Bishopsgate 
street  —  where  Shakespeare  once  lived  —  you 
may  find  Crosby  House ;  the  same  to  which,  in 
Shakespeare's  tragedy,  the  Duke  of  Gloster 
requests  the  retirement  of  Lady  Anne.  It  is  a 
restaurant  now  ;  and  you  may  enjoy  a  capital 
chop  and  excellent  beer,  in  the  veritable  throne- 
room  of  Richard  the  Third.  The  house  of  Cardi- 
nal Wolsey,  in  Fleet  street  is  now  a  shop.  Milton 
once  lived  in  Golden  Lane ;  and  Golden  Lane  was 
a  sweet  and  quiet  spot.  It  is  a  slum  now,  dingy 
and  dismal,  and  the  visitor  is  glad  to  get  out  of  it. 
To-day  makes  use  of  yesterday,  all  the  world  over. 
It  is  not  in  London,  certainly,  that  you  find  much 
of  anything  —  except  old  churches  —  mouldering 
in  silence,  solitude,  and  neglect. 

Those  who  see  every  day,  during  the  Parliamen- 
tary session,  the  mace  that  is  borne  through  the 
lobby  of  the  House  of  Commons,  although  they  are 

4 


50  The  Trip  to  England.  < 

obliged,  on  every  occasion,  to  remove  their  hats  as 
it  passes,  do  not,  probably,  view  that  symbol  with 
much  interest.  Yet  it  is  the  same  mace  that  Oliver 
Cromwell  insulted,  when  he  dissolved  the  Parlia- 
ment, and  cried  out  "Take  away  that  bauble  !  "  I 
saw  it  one  day,  on  its  passage  to  the  table  of  the 
Commons,  and  was  glad  to  remove  the  hat  of  .re- 
spect to  what  it  signifies  —  the  power  and  majesty 
of  the  free  people  of  England.  The  Speaker  of 
the  House  was  walking  behind  it,  very  grand  in 
his  wig  and  gown,  and  the  members  trooped  in 
at  his  heels,  to  secure  their  places  by  being  pre- 
sent at  the  opening  prayer.  A  little  later  I  was 
provided  with  a  seat,  in  a  dim  corner,  in  that 
august  assemblage  of  British  Senators,  and  could 
observe  at  ease  their  management  of  the  public 
business.  The  Speaker  was  on  his  throne ;  the 
mace  was  on  its  table ;  the  hats  of  the  Commons 
were  on  their  heads  ;  and  over  this  singular,  ani- 
mated, every-day,  and  yet  impressive  scene,  the 
waning  light  of  a  summer  afternoon  poured  softly 
down,  through  the  high,  stained,  and  pictured  win- 
dows of  one  of  the  most  symmetrical  halls  in  the 
world.  It  did  not  happen  to  be  a  day  of  excitement. 
The  Irish  members  had  not  then  begun  to  impede 
the  transaction  of  business,  for  the  sake  of  drawing 
attention  to  the  everlasting  wrongs  of  Ireland.  Yet 
it  was  a  lively  day.  Curiosity  on  the  part  of  the 
Opposition,  and  a  respectful  dubiousness  on  the 
part  of  Her  Majesty's  representatives,  were  the  pre- 


The  Palace  of  //  'cstminsicr.  5 1 

vailinc  conditions.  I  thought  I  had  never  before 
heard  so  many  questions  asked  —  outside  of  tiic 
French  grammar  —  and  asked  to  so  little  purpose. 
Everybody  wanted  to  know,  and  nobody  wanted  to 
tell.  Each  inquirer  took  off  his  hat  when  he  rose 
to  ask,  and  put  it  on  again,  when  he  sat  down  to  be 
answered.  Each  governmental  sphinx  bared  his 
brow  when  he  emerged  to  divulge,  and  covered  it 
again  when  he  subsided  without  divulging.  The 
respect  of  all  these  interlocutors  for  each  other 
steadily  remained,  however,  of  the  most  deferential 
and  considerate  description  ;  so  that  —  without  dis- 
courtesy—  it  was  impossible  not  to  think  of  Byron's 
''  mildest  mannered  man  tliat  ever  scuttled  sliip  or 
cut  a  throat."  Underneath  this  velvety,  purring, 
conventional  manner  tlie  observer  could  readily 
discern  the  fires  of  passion,  prejudice,  and  strong 
antagonism.  They  make  no  parade  in  the  House 
of  Commons.  Tliey  attend  to  their  business.  And 
upon  every  topic  that  is  brought  before  their  notice 
they  have  definite  ideas,  strong  convictions,  and 
settled  purposes.  The  topic  of  Army  Estimates, 
upon  the  occasion  to  whicli  I  refer,  seemed  espe- 
cially to  arouse  their  ardour.  Discussion  of  this 
was  continually  diversified  by  cries  of  "  O  !  "  and 
of  '•  Hear  !  "  and  of  "  Order  !  "  and  sometimes  these 
cries  smacked  more  of  derision  than  of  compliment. 
Many  persons  spoke,  but  no  person  spoke  well. 
An  off-hand,  matter-of-fact,  shambling  method  of 
speech  would  seem  to  be  the  fashion,  in  tlie  British 


52  The  Dip  to  Etigland. 

House  of  Commons.  I  remembered  the  anecdote 
that  De  Ouincey  tells,  about  Sheridan  and  the 
young  member  who  quoted  Greek.  It  was  easy  to 
perceive  how  completely  out  of  place  the  sophomore 
orator  would  be,  in  that  assemblage.  Britons  like 
better  to  make  speeches  than  to  hear  them,  and 
they  never  will  be  slaves  to  oratory.  The  moment 
a  certain  windy  gentleman  got  the  floor,  and  be'gan 
to  read  a  manuscript  respecting  the  Indian  Govern- 
ment, as  many  as  forty  Commons  arose  and  noisily 
walked  out  of  the  House.  Your  pilgrim  likewise 
hailed  the  moment  of  his  dehverance,  and  was  glad 
to  escape  to  the  open  air. 

Books  have  been  written  to  describe  the  Palace 
of  Westminster;  but  it  is  observable  that  this 
structure,  however  much  its  magnificence  deserves 
commemorative  applause,  is  deficient,  as  yet,  in  the 
charm  which  resides  in  association.  The  old  Pal- 
ace of  St.  James,  with  its  low,  dusky  walls,  its 
round  towers,  and  its  fretted  battlements,  is  more 
impressive,  because  history  has  freighted  it  with 
meaning,  and  time  has  made  it  beautiful.  But  the 
Palace  of  Westminster  is  a  splendid  structure.  It 
covers  eight  acres  of  ground,  on  the  bank  of  the 
Thames  ;  it  contains  eleven  quadrangles  and  five 
hundred  rooms  ;  and,  when  its  niches  for  statuary 
have  all  been  filled,  it  will  contain  two  hundred  and 
twenty-six  statues.  The  monuments  in  St.  Ste- 
phen's Hall  —  into  which  you  pass  from  Westminster 
Hall,  which  has  been  incorporated  into  the  Palace, 


The  Palace  of  Westminster.  53 

and  is  its  only  ancient,  and  therefore  its  most  inter- 
esting feature  —  indicate,  very  eloquently,  what  a 
superb  art-gallery  this  will  one  day  become.  The 
statues  are  the  images  of  Selden,  Hampden,  Falk- 
land, Clarendon,  Somers,  Walpole,  Chatham,  Mans- 
field, Burke,  Fox,  Pitt,  and  Grattan.  Those  of 
Mansfield  and  Grattan  present,  perhaps,  the  most 
of  character  and  power,  making  you  feel  that  they 
are  indubitably  accurate  portraits,  and  drawing  you 
by  the  charm  of  personality.  There  are  statues, 
also,  in  Westminster  Hall,  commemorative  of  the 
Georges,  William  and  Mary,  and  Anne:  but  it  is 
not  of  these  you  tiiink,  nor  of  any  local  and  every- 
day object,  when  you  stand  beneath  the  wonderful 
roof  of  Richard  the  Second.  Nearly  eight  hundred 
years  "  their  cloudy  wings  e.vpand  "  above  this  fab- 
ric, and  copiously  shed  upon  it  the  fragrance  of  old 
renown.  Richard  the  Second  was  deposed  there  : 
Cromwell  was  there  installed  Lord  Protector  of  Enjr- 
land:  John  Fisher,  Sir  Thomas  More,  and  Straf- 
ford were  there  condemned  :  and  it  was  there  that 
the  possible,  if  not  usual,  devotion  of  woman's  heart 
was  so  touchingly  displayed,  by  her 

"Whose  faith  drew  strength  from  death, 
And  prayed  her  Russell  up  to  God." 

No  one  can  realize,  without  personal  experience, 
the  number  and  variety  of  pleasures  accessible  to 
the  resident  of  London.  These  may  not  be  piquant 
to  him  who  has  tliem  alwavs  within  his  reach.     I 


54  The  Trip  to  England. 

met  with  several  residents  of  the  British  Capital  who 
had  always  intended  to  visit  the  Tower,  but  had  never 
done  so.  But  to  the  stranger  they  possess  a  con- 
stant and  keen  fascination.  The  Derby  this  year 
[1877],  was  thought  to  be,  comparatively,  a  tame 
race  ;  but  I  know  of  one  spectator  who  saw  it  from 
the  top  of  the  Grand  Stand  and  thought  that  the 
scene  it  presented  was  wonderfully  brilliant.  The 
sky  had  been  overcast  with  dull  clouds  till  the  mo- 
ment when  the  race  was  won  ;  but,  just  as  Archer, 
rising  in  his  saddle,  lifted  his  horse  forward  and 
gained  the  goal  alone,  the  sun  burst  forth,  and  shed 
upon  the  Downs  a  sheen  of  gold,  and  lit  up  all  the 
distant  hills,  and  all  the  ,far-stretching  roads  that 
wind  away  from  the  region  of  Epsom  like  threads 
of  silver  through  the  green.  Carrier-pigeons  were 
instantly  launched  off  to  London,  with  the  news  of 
the  victory  of  Silvio.  There  was  one  winner  on 
the  Grand  Stand  who  had  laid  bets  on  Silvio,  for 
no  other  reason  than  because  this  horse  bore  the 
prettiest  name  in  the  list.  The  Derby,  like  Christ- 
mas, comes  but  once  a  year  ;  but  other  allurements 
are  almost  perennial.  Greenwich,  for  instance, 
with  its  delicious  white-bait  dinner,  invites  the  epi- 
cure during  the  best  part  of  the  London  season. 
The  favourite  tavern  is  the  Trafalgar  —  in  which 
each  room  is  named  after  some  magnate  of  the 
old  British  Navy ;  and  Nelson,  Hardy,  and  Rodney 
are  household  words.  Another  cheery  place  of  re- 
sort is  The  Ship.    The  Hospitals  are  at  Greenwich, 


The  Palace  of  Westininstcr.  55 

that  Dr.  Johnson  tliought  to  be  too  fine  for  a  char- 
ity ;  and  back  of  tliese  —  which  are  ordinary  enough 
now,  in  comparison  witli  modern  structures  erected 
for  a  kindred  purpose — stands  the  famous  Obser- 
vatory whicli  keeps  time  for  Europe.  This  place 
is  hallowed,  also,  by  the  grave  of  Wolfe  —  to  whom, 
however  there  is  a  monument  in  Westminster  Ab- 
bey. Greenwich  sets  one  tliinking  of  Queen  Eliza- 
beth, who  was  born  there,  who  often  held  her  court 
there,  and  who  often  sailed  thence,  in  her  barge,  up 
the  river,  to  Richmond — her  favourite  retreat,  and 
the  scene  of  her  last  days  and  her  wretched  death. 
Few  spots  can  compare  with  Richmond,  in  brill- 
iancy of  landscape.  This  place  — the  Shene  of  old 
times  —  was  long  a  royal  residence.  The  woods 
and  meadows  that  you  see  from  the  terrace  of  the 
Star  and  Garter  Tavern  —  spread  out  on  a  rolling 
plain  as  far  as  the  eje  can  reach  —  sparkle  like 
emeralds ;  and  the  Thames,  dotted  with  little  toy- 
like boats,  propelled  by  the  oars  of  coquettishly 
apparelled  rowers,  shines  with  all  the  deep  lustre  of 
the  black  eyes  of  Spain.  Pope's  lovely  home  is 
here,  in  the  village  of  Twickenham  ;  and  not  far 
away  glimmers  forth  to  view  the  "  pale  shrine  "  of 
the  poet  Thomson  —  whose  dust  is  in  Richmond 
Church.  As  I  drove  through  the  vast  and  sweetly 
sylvan  Park  of  Richmond,  in  the  late  afternoon  of  a 
breezy  summer  day,  and  heard  the  whispering  of 
the  great  elms,  and  saw  the  gentle,  trustful  deer 
couched  at  ease,  in  tlie  golden  glades,  I  heard  all  the 


56 


The  Trip  to  England, 


while,  in  the  quiet  chambers  of  thought,  the  tender 
lament  of  Collins  —  which  is  now  a  prophecy  ful- 
filled : 

"  Remembrance  oft  shall  haunt  the  shore, 

When  Thames  in  summer  wreaths  is  drest ; 
And  oft  suspend  the  dashing  oar, 
To  bid  his  gentle  spirit  rest." 


VI. 


WARWICK   AND    KENILWORTH. 


A  LL  the  way  from  London  to  Warwick  it  rained  ; 
•*■  ^  not  lieavily  but  witli  a  gentle  fall.  Tlie  grey 
clouds  hung  low  over  the  landscape,  and  softly 
darkened  it  ;  so  that  meadows  of  scarlet  and 
emerald,  the  shining  foliage  of  elms,  grey  turret, 
nestled  cottage,  and  limpid  river  were  as  mysteri- 
ous and  evanescent  as  pictures  seen  in  dreams. 
At  Warwick  the  rain  had  fallen  and  ceased,  and 
the  walk  from  the  station  to  the  inn  was  on  a 
road  —  or  on  a  foot-path  by  the  road-side  —  still 
hard  and  damp  with  the  water  it  had  absorbed. 
A  fresh  wind  blew  from  the  fields,  sweet  witli  the 
rain  and  fragrant  with  the  odour  of  leaves  and 
rtowers.     The  streets  of  the  ancient  town  —  entered 


58  The  Trip  to  England. 

through  an  old  Norman  arch  —  were  deserted  and 
silent.  It  was  Sunday  when  I  first  came  to  the 
country  of  Shakespeare  ;  and  over  all  the  region 
there  brooded  a  sacred  stillness  pecuhar  to  the 
time  and  harmonious  beyond  utterance  with  the 
sanctity  of  the  place.  As  I  strive,  after  many 
days,  to  call  back  and  to  fix  in  words  the  impres- 
sions of  that  sublime  experience,  the  same  avVe 
falls  upon  me  now  which  fell  upon  me  then. 
Nothing  else  upon  earth  —  no  natural  scene,  no 
relic  of  the  past,  no  pageantry  of  the  present  — 
can  vie  with  the  shrine  of  Shakespeare,  in  power 
to  impress,  to  humble,  and  to  exalt  the  devout 
spirit  that  has  been  nurtured  at  the  fountain  of  his 
transcendent  genius. 

A  fortunate  way  to  approach  Stratford-on-Avon 
is  by  Warwick  and  Kenilworth.  These  places  are 
not  on  a  direct  line  of  travel  ;  but  the  scenes  and 
associations  which  they  successively  present  are 
such  as  assume  a  symmetrical  order,  increase  in 
interest,  and  grow  to  a  delightful  culmination.  Ob- 
jects which  Shakespeare  himself  must  have  seen 
are  still  visible  there  ;  and,  little  by  little,  in  con- 
tact with  these,  the  pilgrim  through  this  haunted 
region  is  mentally  saturated  with  that  atmosphere 
of  serenity  and  romance  in  which  the  youth  of 
Shakespeare  was  passed,  and  by  which  his  works 
and  his  memory  are  embalmed.  No  one  should 
come  abruptly  upon  the  Poet's  Home.  The  mind 
needs    to    be   prepared    for    the    impression   that 


JVarwick  and  Kenilivorlh.  59 

avvails  it ;  and  in  tliis  gradual  approach  it  finds 
preparation,  both  suitable  and  delicious.  Tiie 
luxuriance  of  tlie  country  —  its  fertile  fields,  its 
brilliant  foliage,  its  myriads  of  wild  flowers,  its 
pomp  of  colour  and  of  physical  vigour  and  bloom, 
do  not  fail  to  announce,  to  every  mind  —  howso- 
ever heedless  —  that  this  is  a  fit  place  for  the  birth 
and  nurture  of  a  great  man.  But  this  is  not  all. 
As  you  stroll  in  the  quaint  streets  of  Warwick,  as 
you  drive  to  Kenilworth,  as  you  muse  in  that 
poetic  ruin,  as  you  pause  in  the  old  grave-yard  in 
the  valley  below,  as  you  pass  beneatli  the  crum- 
bling arch  of  the  ancient  Priory,  at  every  step  of 
the  way  you  are  haunted  by  a  vague  sense  of 
some  impending  grandeur  ;  you  are  aware  of  a 
presence  that  fills  and  sanctifies  the  scene.  The 
emotion  that  is  thus  inspired  is  very  glorious  ; 
never  to  be  elsewhere  felt ;  and  never  to  be  for- 
gotten. 

The  cyclopvcdias  and  the  guide-books  dilate, 
wMth  much  particularity  and  characteristic  elo- 
quence, upon  Warwick  Castle  and  other  great 
features  of  Warwickshire  ;  and  an  ofF-hand  sketch 
cannot  aspire,  and  should  not  attempt,  to  emulate 
those  authentic  chronicles.  The  attribute  which 
all  such  records  omit  is  the  atmosphere  ;  and  this, 
perhaps,  is  rather  to  be  indicated  than  described. 
The  prevailing  quality  of  it  is  a  certain  high  and 
sweet  solemnity  —  a  feeling  kindred  with  the  pla- 
cid, happy  melancholy  that  steals  over  the    mind. 


6o  The  Trip  to  E/igland. 

when,  on  a  sombre  afternoon  in  autumn,  you 
stand  in  the  church-yard,  and  Hsten,  amidst  rus- 
tling branches  and  sighing  grass,  to  the  low  mu- 
sic of  distant  organ  and  chaunting  choir.  Peace, 
haunted  by  romance,  dwells  here  in  reverie.  The 
great  tower  of  Warwick,  based  in  silver  Avon  and 
pictured  in  its  slumbering  waters,  seems  musing 
upon  the  centuries  over  which  it  has  watched,  anfl 
full  of  unspeakable  knowledge  and  thought.  The 
dark  and  massive  gate-ways  of  the  town  and  the 
timber-crossed  fronts  of  its  antique  houses  live  on 
in  the  same  strange  dream  and  perfect  repose ;  and 
all  along  the  drive  to  Kenilworth  are  equal  images 
of  rest  —  of  a  rest  in  which  there  is  nothing  supine 
or  sluggish,  no  element  of  death  or  decay,  "but  in 
which  passion,  imagination,  beauty,  and  sorrow, 
seized  at  their  topmost  poise,  seem  crystallized  in 
eternal  calm.  What  opulence  of  splendid  life  is 
vital  forever  in  Kenilworth's  crumbling  ruin,  there 
are  no  words  to  say.  What  pomp  of  royal  banners  ! 
what  dignity  of  radiant  cavaliers  !  what  loveliness 
of  stately  and  exquisite  ladies  !  what  magnificence 
of  banquets  !  wliat  wealth  of  pageantry !  what 
lustre  of  illumination  !  The  same  perfect  music 
that  the  old  poet  Gascoigne  heard  there,  three 
hundred  years  ago,  is  still  sounding  on,  to-day. 
The  proud  and  cruel  Leicester  still  walks  in  his 
vaulted  hall.  The  imperious  face  of  the  Virgin 
Queen  still  from  her  dais  looks  down  on  plumed 
courtiers  and  jeweled  dames  ;  and  still  the  moon- 


IVitnc'ick  and  Kenihvorth.  6i 

light,  streaming  through  the  turret-window,  falls 
on  the  white  bosom  and  the  great,  startled,  black 
eyes  of  Amy  Kobsart,  waiting  for  her  lover.  The 
gaze  of  the  pilgrim,  indeed,  rests  only  upon  old, 
grey,  broken  walls,  overgrown  with  green  moss 
and  ivy,  and  pierced  by  irregular  casements 
through  which  the  sun  shines,  and  the  winds  blow, 
and  the  rains  drive,  and  the  birds  fly,  amidst  utter 
desolation.  But  silence  and  ruin  are  here  alike 
eloquent  and  awful  ;  and,  much  as  the  place 
impresses  you  by  what  remains,  it  impresses  you 
far  more  by  what  has  vanished.  Ambition,  love, 
pleasure,  power,  misery,  tragedy  —  these  are  gone  ; 
and  being  gone  they  are  immortal.  I  plucked,  in 
the  garden  of  Kenilworth,  one  of  the  most  brilliant 
red  roses  that  ever  grew  ;  and,  as  I  pressed  it  to 
my  lips,  I  seemed  to  touch  the  lips  of  that  superb, 
bewildering  beauty  who  outweighed  England's 
crown,  and  whose  spirit  is  the  everlasting  genius 
of  the  place. 

There  is  a  crescent  of  tliatch-roofed  cottages 
close  by  the  ruins  of  the  old  castle,  in  which  con- 
tentment seems  to  have  made  her  home.  The  ivy 
embowers  them.  The  roses  cluster  around  their 
little  windows.  The  greensward  slopes  away,  in 
front,  from  the  big,  flat  stones  that  are  embedded 
in  the  grassy  sod  before  their  doors.  Down  in  the 
valley,  hard  by,  your  steps  stray  through  an  an- 
cient grave-yard  —  in  which  modern  hands  have 
built  a  tiny  church,  witli  tower,  and  clock,  and  bell 


62  The  Trip  to  England. 

—  and  past  the  remains  of  a  Priory,  long  since 
destroyed.  At  many  anotlier  point,  on  the  roads 
betwixt  Warwick  and  Kenilworth  and  Stratford,  I 
came  upon  such  nests  of  cosey,  rustic  quiet  and 
seeming  happiness.  They  build  their  country 
houses  low,  in  England,  so  that  the  trees  over- 
hang them,  and  the  cool,  friendly,  flower-gemmed 
earth — parent,  and  stay,  and  bourne  of  mortal 
life  !  —  is  tenderly  taken  into  their  companionship. 
Here,  at  Kenilworth,  as  elsewhere,  at  such  places 
as  Richmond,  Maidenhead,  Cookham,  and  the 
region  round  about  Windsor,  I  saw  many  a  sweet 
nook  where  tired  life  might  well  be  content  to  lay 
down  its  burden  and  enter  into  its  rest.  In  all 
true  love  of  country  —  a  passion  which  seems  to  be 
more  deeply  felt  in  England  than  anywhere  else 
upon  the  globe — there  is  love  for  the  literal  soil 
itself  :  and  that  sentiment  in  the  human  heart  is 
equally  natural  and  pious  which  inspires  and 
perpetuates  man's  desire  that  where  he  found  his 
cradle  he  may  also  find  his  grave. 

Under  a  cloudy  sky,  and  through  a  landscape 
still  wet  and  shining  with  recent  rains,  the  drive 
to  Stratford  was  a  pleasure  so  exquisite  that  at  last 
it  became  a  pain.  Just  as  the  carriage  reached 
the  junction  of  the  Warwick  and  Snitterfield  roads, 
a  ray  of  sunshine,  streaming  through  a  rift  in  the 
clouds,  fell  ujjon  the  neiglibouring  hill-side,  scarlet 
with  poppies,  and  lit  the  scene  as  with  the  glory 
of  a  celestial  benediction.     This  sunburst,  neither 


Wanc'ick  and  Kcnilworth.  63 

growing  larger  nor  coming  nearer,  followed  all  the 
way  to  Stratford  ;  and  there,  on  a  sudden,  the 
clouds  were  lifted  and  dispersed,  and  "  fair  day- 
light"  flooded  the  whole  green  country-side.  The 
afternoon  sun  was  still  high  in  heaven  when  I 
alisrhted  at  the  Red  Horse  Inn,  and  entered  the 
little  parlour  of  Washington  Irving.  They  keep 
the  room  very  much  as  it  was  when  he  left  it ;  for 
they  are  proud  of  liis  gentle  genius  and  grateful  for 
his  commemorative  words.  In  a  corner  stands  the 
small,  old-fashioned  hair-cloth  arm-chair,  in  which 
he  sat,  on  that  night  of  memory  and  of  musing 
which  he  has  described  in  the  "  Sketch  Book."  A 
brass  plate  is  affixed  to  it,  bearing  his  name ;  and 
the  visitor  observes,  in  token  of  its  age  and  service, 
that  the  hair-cloth  of  its  seat  is  considerably  worn 
and  frayed.  Every  American  pilgrim  to  Stratford 
sits  in  this  chair  ;  and  looks  witli  tender  interest 
on  the  old  fire-place ;  and  reads  the  memorials  of 
Irving  that  are  hung  upon  the  walls  :  and  it  is  no 
small  comfort  there  to  reflect  that  our  own  illustri- 
ous countryman  —  whose  name  will  be  remembered 
with  honour,  as  long  as  true  literature  is  prized 
among  men  —  was  the  first,  in  modern  days,  to 
discover  the  beauties  and  to  interpret  the  poetry 
of  the  birth-place  of  Shakespeare. 


VII. 


STRATFORD-ON-AVON. 


/^NCE  again,  as  it  did  on  that  delicious  summer 
^^  afternoon  which  is  forever  memorable  in  my 
life,  the  golden  glory  of  the  westering  sun  burns 
on  the  grey  spire  of  Stratford  Church,  and  on  the 
ancient  grave-yard  below,  —  wherein  the  mossy 
stones  lean  this  way  and  that,  in  sweet  and 
orderly  confusion,  —  and  on  the  peaceful  avenue 
of  limes,  and  on  the  burnished  water  of  silver 
Avon.  The  tall,  arched,  many-coloured  windows 
of  the  church  glint  in  the  evening  light.  A 
cool  and  fragrant  wind  is  stirring  the  branches 
and  the  grass.  The  small  birds,  calling  to  their 
mates,  or  sporting  in  the  wanton  pleasure  of  their 
airy   life,    are    circling    over   the    church    roof,    or 


Stratford  on-Avon,  65 

hidincj  in  little  crevices  of  its  walls.  On  the 
vacant  meadows  across  the  river  stretch  away  the 
long  and  level  shadows  of  the  pompous  elms. 
Mere  and  there,  upon  tlie  river's  brink,  arc  pairs  of 
wliat  seem  lovers,  strolling  by  the  reedy  marge, 
or  sitting  upon  the  low  tombs,  in  the  Sabbath 
quiet.  As  the  sun  sinks  and  the  dusk  deepens, 
two  figures  of  infirm  old  women,  clad  in  black, 
pass  with  slow  and  feeble  steps  through  the 
avenue  of  limes,  and  vanish  around  an  angle  of 
the  church  —  whicii  now  stands  all  in  shadow : 
and  no  sound  is  heard  but  the  faint  rustling  of  the 
leaves. 

Once  again,  as  on  that  sacred  night,  the  streets 
of  Stratford  are  deserted  and  silent  under  the 
star-lit  sky,  and  I  am  standing,  in  the  dim  dark- 
ness, at  the  door  of  the  cottage  in  whicli  Shakes- 
peare was  born.  It  is  empty,  dark,  and  still; 
and  in  all  the  neighbourhood  there  is  no  stir  nor 
sign  of  life;  but  the  quaint  casements  and  gables 
of  tliis  haunted  house,  its  antique  porch,  and  the 
great  timbers  that  cross  its  front  are  luminous 
as  with  a  light  of  their  own,  so  that  I  see  them 
with  perfect  distinctness.  I  stand  there  a  long 
time,  and  I  know  that  I  am  to  remember  these 
sights  forever,  as  I  see  them  now.  After  a 
while,  with  lingering  reluctance,  I  turn  away 
from  this  marvellous  spot,  and,  presently  passing 
through  a  little,  winding  lane,  I  walk  in  the  High 
street    of    the    town,    and    mark,    at    the    end    of 

5 


66  The  Trip  to  Eiigla7id. 

the  prospect,  the  iHuminated  clock  in  the  tower 
of  the  chapel  of  the  Holy  Cross.  A  few  chance- 
directed  steps  bring  me  to  what  was  New  Place 
once,  where  Shakespeare  died  ;  and  there  again  I 
pause,  and  long  remain  in  meditation,  gazing 
into  the  inclosed  garden,  where,  under  frames  of 
glass,  are  certain  strange  fragments  of  lime  and 
stone.  These — which  I  do  not  then  know  —  are 
the  remains  of  the  foundation  of  Shakespeare's 
house.  The  night  wanes ;  and  still  I  walk  in 
Stratford  streets  ;  and  by  and  by  I  am  standing 
on  the  bridge  that  spans  the  Avon,  and  looking 
down  at  the  thick-clustering  stars  reflected  in  its 
black  and  silent  stream.  At  last,  under  the  roof 
of  the  Red  Horse,  I  sink  into  a  troubled  slumber, 
from  which  very  soon  a  strain  of  celestial  music  — 
strong,  sweet,  jubilant,  and  splendid  —  awakens 
me  in  an  instant,  and  I  start  up  in  my  bed  —  to 
find  that  all  around  me  is  still  as  death  ;  and  then, 
drowsily,  far-off,  the  bell  strikes  three,  in  its  weird 
and  lonesome  tower. 

Every  pilgrim  to  Stratford  knows  beforehand, 
in  a  general  way,  what  he  will  there  behold. 
Copious  and  frequent  description  of  its  Shakes- 
pearean associations  have  made  the  place 
familiar  to  all  the  world.  Yet  these  Shakes- 
pearean associations  keep  a  perennial  freshness, 
and  are  equally  a  surprise  to  the  sight  and  a 
wonder  to  the  soul.  Though  three  centuries  old, 
they  are  not  yet  stricken  with  age  or  decay.     The 


Stratford-ott-Avon.  67 

house  in  Henley  street,  in  which,  according  to 
accepted  tradition,  Shakespeare  was  born,  has 
been  from  time  to  time  repaired ;  and  so  it  has 
been  kept  sound,  without  having  been  materially 
changed  from  what  it  was  in  Shakespeare's  youth. 
Tiie  kind  old  ladies  who  now  take  care  of  it, 
and,  with  so  much  pride  and  courtesy,  show  it  to 
the  visitor,  called  my  attention  to  a  bit  of  the 
ceiling  of  the  upper  chamber — the  alleged  room 
of  Shakespeare's  birth  —  which  had  begun  to  sag, 
and  had  been  skilfully  mended,  with  little  laths. 
It  is  in  this  room  that  the  numerous  autographs 
are  scrawled  all  over  the  ceiling  and  walls.  One 
side  of  the  chimney-piece  here  is  called  '■'■  The 
Actor's  Pillar,"  so  thickly  is  it  covered  with  the 
names  of  actors  ;  Edmund  Kean's  signature  being 
among  them,  and  still  clearly  legible.  On  one  of 
the  window-panes,  cut  with  a  diamond,  is  the 
name  of  "  W.  Scott "  ;  and  all  the  panes  are 
scratched  with  signatures — making  you  think  of 
Douglas  Jerrold's  remark  on  bad  Shakespearean 
commentators,  that  they  resemble  persons  who 
write  on  glass  with  diamonds,  and  obscure  the 
light  with  a  multitude  of  scratches.  The  floor  of 
this  room,  uncarpeted,  and  almost  snow-white 
with  much  washing,  seems  still  as  hard  as  iron  ; 
yet  its  boards  have  been  hollowed  by  wear,  and 
the  heads  of  the  old  nails,  that  fasten  it  down, 
gleam  like  polished  silver.  You  can  sit  in  an 
antique  chair,    in    a   corner   of  this    room,  if   you 


68  The  Trip  io  England.  ' 

like,  and  think  unutterable  tilings.  There  is, 
certainly,  no  word  that  can  even  remotely  suggest 
the  feeling  with  which  you  are  there  overwhelmed. 
You  can  sit,  also,  in  the  room  below,  in  the  very 
seat,  in  the  corner  of  the  wide  fire-place,  that 
Shakespeare  himself  must  often  have  occupied. 
They  keep  but  a  few  sticks  of  furniture  in  any 
part  of  the  cottage.  One  room  is  devoted  to 
Shakespearean  curiosities — or  relics  —  more  or 
less  authentic ;  one'  of  which  is  a  school-boy's 
form  or  desk,  that  was  obtained  from  the  old 
grammar  school  in  High  street,  now  modern  in  its 
appointments,  in  which  Shakespeare  was  once 
a  pupil.  At  the  back  of  the  cottage,  now  iso- 
lated from  all  contiguous  structures,  is  a  pleasant 
garden,  and  at  one  side  is  a  cosey,  luxurious 
little  cabin  —  the  home  of  order  and  of  pious 
decorum  —  for  the  ladies  who  are  custodians  of 
the  Shakespeare  House.  If  you  are  a  favoured 
visitor,  you  may  receive  from  this  garden,  at 
parting,  all  the  flowers,  prettily  affixed  to  a  sheet 
of  purple-edged  paper,  that  poor  Ophelia  names, 
in  the  scene  of  her  madness.  '*  There's  rosemary, 
that's  for  remembrance  :  and  there  is  pansies, 
that's  for  thoughts :  there's  fennel  for  you,  and 
columbines:  there's  rue  for  you  :  there's  a  daisy: 
—  I  would  give  you  some  violets,  but  they  withered 
all  when  my  father  died." 

The  minute  knowledge  that  Shakespeare  had  of 
plants   and    flowers,    and   the   loving   appreciation 


Stratford-on-Avon.  69 

with  wliich  lie  describes  pastoral  scenery,  are 
explained  to  the  rambler  in  Stratford,  by  all  that 
he  sees  and  hears.  There  is  a  walk  across  the 
fields  to  Shottery  —  which  the  poet  must  often 
have  taken,  in  the  days  of  his  courtship  of  Anne 
Hathaway  —  whereon  the  feet  of  the  traveller  are 
buried  in  wild  flowers  and  furrow  weeds.  The 
high  road  to  the  hamlet,  also,  passes  through 
rich  meadows,  and  lands  teeming  with  grain, 
flecked  everywhere  with  those  brilliant  scarlet 
poppies  which  are  so  radiant  and  so  bewitching  in 
the  English  landscape.  To  have  grown  up  amidst 
such  surroundings,  and,  above  all,  to  have  e.xperi- 
enced  amidst  them  the  passion  of  love,  must  have 
been,  with  Shakespeare,  the  intuitive  acquire- 
ment of  most  ample  and  most  specific  knowledge 
of  their  manifold  beauties.  It  would  be  hard  to 
find  a  sweeter  rustic  retreat  than  Anne  Hathaway's 
cottage  is,  even  now.  The  tall  trees  embower  it  ; 
and  over  its  porches,  and  all  along  its  picturesque, 
irregular  front,  and  on  its  thatch-roof,  the  wood- 
bine and  the  ivy  climb,  and  there  are  wild  roses 
and  the  maiden's  blush.  For  the  young  poet's 
wooing  no  place  could  be  fitter  than  this!  He 
would  always  remember  it  with  tender  joy.  They 
show  you,  in  that  cottage,  an  old  settle,  by  the 
fireside,  whereon  the  lovers  may  have  sat  together ; 
and  in  the  rude  little  chamber  next  the  roof,  an 
antique,  carved  bedstead,  which  Anne  Hathaway 
once  owned.     This,  it  is  thought,  continued  to  be 


70  The  Trip  to  England.  ' 

Anne's  home,  for  many  years  of  her  married  hfe  — 
her  husband  being  absent  in  London,  and  some- 
times coming  down  to  visit  her,  at  Shottery.  "  He 
was  wont,"  says  Aubrey,  "  to  go  to  his  native 
country  once  a  year."  The  last  surviving  descend- 
ant of  the  Hathaway  family  —  Mrs.  Taylor  —  lives 
in  the  house  now,  and  welcomes  with  homely  hos'' 
pitality  the  wanderers,  from  all  lands,  who  seek 
—  in  a  sympathy  and  reverence  most  honourable 
to  human  nature  !  —  the  shrine  of  Shakespeare's 
love.  There  is  one  such  wanderer  who  will  never 
forget  the  parting  pressure  of  this  good  woman's 
hand,  and  who  has  never  parted  with  her  farewell 
gift  of  woodbine  and  roses  from  the  porch  of  Anne 
Hathaway's  cottage. 

In  England  it  is  living,  more  than  writing  about 
it,  that  is  esteemed  by  the  best  persons.  They 
prize  good  writing,  of  course  ;  but  they  prize  noble 
living  far  more.  This  is  an  ingrained  principle 
and  not  an  artificial  habit,  and  this  principle, 
doubtless,  was  as  potent  in  Shakespeare's  age  as 
it  is  to-day.  Nothing  could  be  more  natural  than 
that  this  great  writer  should  think  less  of  his  works 
than  of  the  establishment  of  his  home.  He  would 
desire,  having  won  his  fortune,  to  dwell  in  his 
native  place,  to  enjoy  the  companionship  and 
esteem  of  his  neighbours,  to  participate  in  their 
pleasures,  to  help  them  in  their  troubles,  to  aid 
in  the  improvement  and  embellishment  of  the 
town,  to  deepen  his  hold  upon  the  affections  of  all 


Stratford  on- Avon.  71 

around  him,  and  to  feel  that,  at  last,  honoured 
and  lamented,  his  ashes  would  be  laid  in  the  vil- 
lage church  where  he  had  worshipped  — 

"Among  familiar  names  to  rest. 
And  in  the  places  of  his  youth." 

It  was  in  1597,  about  ten  years  after  he  went 
to  London,  that  the  poet  began  to  buy  property  in 
Stratford,  and  it  was  about  eight  years  after  his 
first  purchase  that  he  finally  settled  there,  at  New 
Place.  This  mansion,  as  all  readers  know,  was 
altered  by  Sir  Hugh  Clopton,  who  owned  it  about 
the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century,  and  was  de- 
stroyed by  the  Rev.  Mr.  Gastrell,  in  1757.  There 
is  a  modern  edifice  on  the  estate  now ;  but 
the  grounds,  which  have  been  reclaimed,  —  chiefly 
through  the  zeal  of  Mr.  Halliwell,  —  are  laid  out 
according  to  the  model  they  are  supposed  to 
have  presented  when  Shakespeare  owned  them. 
His  lawn,  his  orchard,  and  his  garden  are  indi- 
cated ;  and  the  grandson  of  his  mulberry  is 
growing  on  the  very  spot  where  that  famous  tree 
once  flourished.  You  can  see  a  part  of  the  founda- 
tions of  the  old  house.  It  seems  to  have  had 
gables,  and,  no  doubt,  it  was  made  of  stone,  and 
fashioned  witli  tlie  beautiful  curves  and  broken 
lines  of  the  Tudor  architecture.  They  show,  upon 
the  lawn,  a  stone,  of  considerable  size,  which 
surmounted  its  door.  The  site  —  still  the  most 
commodious   in   Stratford  —  is   on    the    corner  of 


72  The  Trip  to  England.  ; 

High  street  and  Cliapel  street;  and  on  the  oppo- 
site corner  stands  now,  as  it  has  stood  for  eight 
hundred  years,  the  chapel  of  the  Holy  Cross,  with 
square,  dark  tower,  and  fretted  battlement,  and 
arched  casements,  and  Norman  porch — one  of 
the  most  romantic  and  picturesque  churches  in 
England.  It  was  easy,  when  standing  on  that 
storied  spot,  to  fancy  Shakespeare,  in  the  gloam- 
ing of  a  summer  day,  strolling  on  the  lawn, 
beneath  his  elms,  and  listening  to  the  soft  and 
solemn  music  of  the  chapel  organ  ;  or  to  think  of 
him  as  stepping  forth  from  his  study,  in  the  late 
and  lonesome  hours  of  the  night,  and  pausing  to 
"  count  the  clock,"  or  note  "  the  exhalations  whiz- 
zing in  the  air." 

The  funeral  train  of  Shakespeare,  on  that  dark 
day  when  it  moved  from  New  Place  to  Stratford 
Church,  had  but  a  little  way  to  go.  The  river, 
surely,  must  have  seemed  to  hush  its  murmurs, 
the  trees  to  droop  their  branches,  the  sunshine  to 
grow  dim  —  as  that  sad  procession  passed!  His 
grave  is  under  the  grey  pavement  of  the  chancel, 
within  the  rail,  and  his  wife  and  two  daughters 
are  buried  beside  him.  The  pilgrim  who  reads, 
upon  the  grave-stone  itself,  those  rugged  lines  of 
grievous  entreaty  and  awful  imprecation  wliich 
guard  the  poet's  rest,  feels  no  doubt  that  he  is 
listening  to  his  living  voice  —  for  he  has  now  seen 
the  enchanting  beauty  of  the  place,  and  he  has 
now  felt  what  passionate  affection  it  can  inspire. 


Stralford-on-Avon.  73 

Feeling  and  not  manner  would  naturally  have 
commanded  tliat  sudden  agonized  supplication 
and  threat.  Nor  does  such  a  pilgrim  doubt,  when 
gazing  on  the  painted  bust,  above  the  grave, — 
made  by  Gerard  Johnson,  stone-cutter,  —  that  he 
beholds  the  authentic  face  of  Shakespeare.  It 
is  not  the  heavy  face  of  tlie  portraits  that  repre- 
sent it.  There  is  a  rapt,  transfigured  quality  in  it, 
which  these  do  not  convey.  It  is  thoughtful, 
austere,  and  yet  benign.  Shakespeare  was  a  hazel- 
eyed  man,  with  auburn  hair,  and  the  colours  that 
he  wore  were  scarlet  and  black.  Being  painted, 
and  also  being  set  up  at  a  considerable  height  on 
the  church  wall,  the  bust  does  not  disclose  what  is 
sufficiently  perceptible  in  a  cast  from  it  —  that  it 
is,  in  fact,  the  copy  of  a  mask  from  the  dead 
face.  One  of  the  cheeks  is  a  little  swollen,  and 
the  tongue  is  very  slightly  protruded,  and  is 
caught  between  the  lips.  It  need  not  be  said 
that  the  old  theory  —  that  the  poet  was  not  a  gen- 
tleman of  sreat  consideration  in  his  own  time  and 
place  —  falls  utterly  and  forever  from  the  mind, 
when  you  stand  at  his  grave.  No  man  could 
have  a  more  honourable  or  sacred  spot  of 
sepulture ;  and  while  it  illustrates  the  profound 
esteem  of  the  community  in  which  he  lived,  it 
testifies  to  the  high  religious  character  by  which 
that  esteem  was  confirmed.  "  I  commend  my 
soul  into  the  hands  of  God,  my  Creator,  hoping,  and 
assuredly   believing,    through    the   only   merits    of 


74  Tlie  Trip  to  England.  '  , 

Jesus  Christ,  my  Saviour,  to  be  made  partaker 
of  life  everlasting."  So  said  Shakespeare,  in  his 
last  Will,  bowing  in  humble  reverence  the  might- 
iest mind — as  vast  and  limitless  in  the  power  to 
comprehend  as  to  express  !  —  that  ever  wore  the 
garments  of  mortality. 

Once  again  there  is  a  sound  of  organ  music, 
very  low  and  soft,  in  Stratford  Church,  and  the 
dim  light,  broken  by  the  richly  stained  windows,' 
streams  across  the  dusky  chancel,  filling  the  still 
air  with  opal  haze,  and  flooding  those  grey  grave- 
stones with  its  mellow  radiance.  Not  a  word  is 
spoken;  but,  at  intervals,  the  rustle  of  the  leaves 
is  audible,  in  a  sighing  wind.  What  visions  are 
these,  that  suddenly  fill  the  region  !  What  royal 
faces  of  monarchs,  proud  with  power,  or  pallid  with 
anguish !  What  sweet,  imperial  women,  gleeful 
with  happy  youth  and  love,  or  wide-eyed  and 
rigid  in  tearless  woe  !  What  warriors,  with  ser- 
pent diadems,  defiant  of  death  and  hell !  The 
mournful  eyes  of  Hamlet;  the  wild  countenance 
of  Lear;  Ariel  with  his  harp,  and  Prospero  with 
his  wand !  Here  is  no  death  !  All  these,  and 
more,  are  immortal  shapes ;  and  he  that  made 
them  so,'  though  his  mortal  part  be  but  a  handful 
of  dust  in  yonder  crypt,  is  a  glorious  angel  beyond 
the  stars ! 


VIII. 


A  GLIMPSE  OF   FRANCE. 


TDARIS,  Aufjust  1st,  1877, —  It  was  a  beautiful 
-■-  afternoon  in  July  when  first  I  saw  the  sliores 
of  France.  The  British  Channel  —  a  most  dis- 
tressful water  when  rough  —  had  been  in  unusual 
pleasure,  like  King  Duncan  in  the  play,  so  that 
"observation  with  extended  view,"  could  look 
with  interest,  and  without  nausea,  on  the  Norman 
coast,  as  it  rose  into  sight  across  the  surges. 
This  coast  seemed  like  the  Palisade  bank  of  the 
Hudson  River,  and  prompted  thoughts  of  home. 
It  is  high  and  precipitous,  and  on  one  of  its  windy 
hills  a  little  chapel  is  perched,  in  picturesque 
loneliness,  to  the  east  of  the  stone  harbour  into 
which   the   arriving  steamer  glides.      At   Dieppe, 


76  77/<?  7)7J>  /t;  England. 

as  at  most  of  the  Channel  ports,  a  long  pier 
projects  into  the  sea,  and  this  was  thronged 
with  spectators,  as  our  boat  steamed  up  to  her 
moorings.  The  ride  from  Dieppe  to  Paris  is 
charming.  The  road  passes  through  Rouen  and 
up  the  Valley  of  the  Seine.  The  sky  that  day 
was  as  blue  and  sunny  as  ever  it  is  in  brilliaiTt 
America;  tlie  air  was  soft  and  cool;  and  the  fields 
of  Normandy  were  lovely  with  rich  colour,  and  gen- 
erous with  abundance  of  golden  crops.  Now  and 
then  we  passed  little  hamlets,  made  up  of  thatched 
cottages  clustered  around  a  tiny  church,  with  its 
sad,  quaint  place  of  graves.  Sheaves  of  wheat 
were  stacked,  in  careless  piles,  in  the  meadows. 
Rows  of  the  tall,  lithe  Lombardy  poplar  —  so  like 
the  willowy  girls  of  France  —  flashed  by,  and  rows 
of  the  tremulous  silver-leaved  maple.  Sometimes 
I  saw  rich  bits  of  garden  grround,  gorgeous  with 
geraniums  and  with  many  of  the  wild  flowers 
(neglected,  for  the  most  part,  in  other  countries), 
which  the  French  know  so  well  how  to  cultivate 
and  train.  In  some  fields  the  reapers  were  at 
work;  in  others  women  were  guiding  the  plough; 
in  others  the  sleek  cattle  and  shaggy  sheep  were 
couched  in  repose,  or  busy  with  the  herbage  ; 
and  through  this  smiling  land  the  Seine  flowed 
peacefully  down,  shining  like  burnished  silver. 
At  Rouen  I  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  round  tower 
and  two  spires  of  the  famous  cathedral  which  is 
there  —  esteemed  one  of   the  best  pieces  of  Gothic 


A  Glimpse  of  France.  7  7 

architecture  in  Europe ;  and  I  thought  of  Cor- 
neille,  who  was  there  born,  and  of  Jean  Dare, 
who  was  tliere  burned.  Just  beyond  Rouen,  on 
the  eastern  bank  of  the  Seine,  the  hills  take,  and 
for  many  miles  preserve,  the  shape  of  natural 
fortifications.  Zigzag  pathways  wind  up  the  faces 
of  these  crags.  A  chapel  crowns  one  of  the 
loftiest  summits.  Cottages  nestle  in  the  vales 
below.  A  few  gaunt  wind-mills  stretch  forth  their 
arms,  upon  the  distant  hills.  Every  rood  of  the 
land  is  cultivated;  and  here,  as  in  England,  the 
scarlet  poppies  brighten  the  green,  while  cosey 
hedge-rows  make  the  landscape  comfortable  to  the 
fancy,  as  well  as  pretty  to  the  eye,  with  a  sense  of 
human  companionship. 

In  the  gloaming  we  glided  into  Paris,  and 
before  I  had  been  there  two  hours  I  was  driving 
in  the  Champs  Elysees  and  thinking  of  the 
Arabian  Nights.  Nobody  can  know,  without 
seeing  them,  how  glorious  and  imperial  the  great 
features  of  Paris  are.  My  first  morning  there  was 
a  Sunday,  and  it  was  made  beautiful  beyond 
expression  by  sunshine,  the  singing  of  birds,  the 
strains  of  music  from  passing  bands,  and  the 
many  sishts  and  sounds  which  in  every  direction 
bespoke  the  cheerfulness  of  the  people.  I  went 
that  day  to  a  fete  in  the  Bois  de  Vincennes,  where 
from  noon  till  midnight  a  great  throng  took  its 
pleasure,  in  the  most  orderly,  simple,  and  child-like 
manner,  and   where   I    saw  a   "picture   in   little" 


78  The  Trip  to  England.  ' 

of  the  manners  of  the  French.     It  was  a  peculiar 
pleasure,  while  in  Paris,  to  rise   at   a  very   early- 
hour    and     stroll     through    the    markets    of     St. 
Honor^,  in  which  flowers  have  at  least  an  equal 
place  with  more  substantial  necessities  of  life,  and 
where  order   and  neatness  are   made   perfect.     It 
was   impressive,   also,  to  walk   in  the  gardens  of 
the    Tuileries,    in    those    lonely    morning    hours, 
and  to  muse  and  moralize  over  the  downfall  of  the 
dynasty  of    Napoleon.      These   gardens,    formerly 
the   private    grounds   of  the    Emperor,    are    now 
opened  to  the  public  ;  and  streams  of   labourers, 
clothed     in     their     blue     blouses,    pour    through 
them    every    day.     They    are    rapidly    rebuilding 
that  part  of  the  Tuileries  which  was  destroyed  by 
the  Commune  ;  and,  in  fact,  though  only  six  years 
have  passed  since  [187 1]  the  last  revolution  devas- 
tated this  capital,  but  little  trace  remains  of  the 
ravages  of  that  wild  time.     The  Arc  de  Triomphe 
stands,  in  solemn  majesty;  the  Column  Vendome 
towers  toward   the  sky  ;    the  golden  figure  seems 
still  in  act  to  fly,  upon  the  top  of  the  Column  of 
the  Bastile.     I  saw,  in  the  church  of  Notre  Dame, 
the    garments  —  stained   with    blood    and    riddled 
with  bullets  —  that  were  worn  by  the  Archbishop 
of  Paris,  when  he  v/as  murdered  by  the  friends  of 
Liberty,    Equality,    and    Fraternity;    and    I    saw, 
with   enthusiastic    admiration,  and  not   without  a 
strong   impulse    to    tears,  the  great    Panorama  of 
the  Siege  of  Paris,  by  F.  Phillipoteaux,  which  was 


A   Glimpse  of  France.  79 

exhibited  in  the  rejjion  of  the  Champs  Elysdcs, 
and  which  is  a  marvel  of  faithful  detail,  true 
colour,  spirited  composition,  and  the  action  and 
suffering  of  war.  But  these  were  all  the  tokens 
that  I  chanced  to  see  of  the  recent  evil  days  of 
France. 

The  more  interesting  sights  of  Paris  are  as- 
sociated with  its  older  history  and  with  the  taste 
and  luxury  of  its  present  period.  Every  person 
who  visits  it  repairs  presently  to  Les  Invalides,  to 
see  the  tomb  of  Napoleon  Buonaparte.  This  is  a 
structure  that  would  inspire  awe,  even  if  it  were 
not  associated  with  that  glittering  name  and 
that  terrible  memory.  The  gloom  of  the  crypt 
in  which  it  is  sunk ;  the  sepulchral  character 
of  the  mysterious,  emblematic  figures  which 
surround  it — "staring  right  on,  with  calm,  eter- 
nal eyes  ; "  the  grandeur  of  the  dome  which 
rises  above  it  ;  and  its  own  vast  size  and 
deathly  shape — all  these  characteristics  unite  to 
make  it  a  most  impressive  object,  apart  from  the 
thrilling  fact  that  in  this  great,  red-sandstone 
coffin  rest,  at  last,  after  the  stormiest  of  all  human 
lives,  the  ashes  of  the  most  vital  man  of  action 
who  has  lived  in  modern  times.  I  was  deeply 
impressed,  too,  by  the  sight  of  the  tombs  of 
Voltaire  and  Rousseau,  in  the  vaults  beneath 
the  Pantheon.  No  device  more  apposite  or  more 
startling  could  have  been  adopted  than  that  which 
assails   you    on    tlie    front    of    Rousseau's    tomb. 


8o  The  Trip  to  Eiigland. 

The  door  stands  ajar,  and  out  o£  it  issues  an 
arm  and  hand,  in  marble,  grasping  a  torch. 
It  was  almost  as  if  the  dead  had  spoken  with 
a  living  voice,  to  see  that  fateful  symbol  of  a 
power  of  thought  and  jDassion  which  never  can 
die  —  while  human  hearts  remain  human.  There 
is  a  fine  statue  of  Voltaire  in  the  vault  that  holds 
his  tomb.  These  mausoleums  are  merely  com- 
memorative. The  body  of  Voltaire,  at  any  rate, 
was  at  once  destroyed  with  quicklime,  when  laid 
in  the  grave,  at  the  Abbey  of  Celleries,  so  that  it 
might  not  be  cast  out  of  consecrated  ground. 
Other  tombs  of  departed  greatness  I  found  in 
Pcre  la  Chaise.  Moliere  and  La  Fontaine  rest 
side  by  side.  Racine  is  a  neighbour  to  them. 
Talma,  Auber,  Rossini,  De  Musset,  Desclee,  and 
many  other  illustrious  names,  may  here  be  read,  in 
the  letters  of  death.  I  came  upon  Rachel's  tomb, 
in  the  Hebrew  quarter  of  the  cemetery.  It  is  a  tall, 
narrow,  stone  structure,  with  a  grated  door,  over 
which  the  name  of  Rachel  —  and  nothing  else  —  is 
graven,  in  black  letters.  Looking  in  through  the 
cratins;  I  saw  a  shelf  on  which  were  vases  and 
flowers,  and  beneath  it  were  fourteen  immortelle 
wreaths.  A  few  cards,  left  by  mourners  of  the 
dead,  or  by  pilgrims  to  this  solemn  shrine  of 
genius  and  illustrious  renown,  were  upon  the 
floor.  I  ventured  to  add  my  own,  humbly  and 
reverently,  to  the  names  which  thus  gave  homage 
to  the  memory  of  a  great  actress,  and  I  gathered 


v)   ^^^ 

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^   Glifnpse  of  France.  S  i 

a  few  leaves  from  the  shrubbery  tliat  grows  in 
front  of  her  grave.  It  is  a  pity  that  this  famous 
cemetery  should  be,  as  it  is,  comparatively  desti- 
tute of  flowers  and  grass.  It  contains  a  few 
avenues  of  trees  ;  but,  for  the  most  part,  it  is  a 
mass  of  ponderous  tombs,  crowded  close  together 
upon  a  hot  hill-side,  traversed  by  little  stony 
pathways  sweltering  in  sun  and  dust.  No  sad- 
der grave-yard  was  ever  seen.  All  the  acute 
anguish  of  remediless  suffering,  all  the  abject 
misery  and  arid  desolation  of  hopeless  grief,  is 
symbolized  in  this  melancholy  place.  Workmen 
were  repairing  the  tomb  of  Heloise  and  Abelard, 
and  this,  for  a  while,  converted  a  bit  of  old 
romance  to  modern  commonness.  Still,  I  saw 
this  tomb,  and  it  was  elevating  to  think  that  there 
may  be 

"  Words  which  are  things, 
Hopes  which  do  not  deceive." 

The  most  gorgeous  modern  building  in  Paris 
is,  undoubtedly,  the  Opera  House.  They  are 
opening  a  street  in  front  of  this  noble  edifice, 
so  as  to  place  it  at  the  end  of  yet  another  vista  — 
as  the  usage  is,  in  this  magnificent  city.  There  is 
no  building  in  America  that  can  vie  with  it  in  or- 
nate splendour.  We  do  but  scant  justice  to  the  solid 
qualities  in  the  French  character.  Grant  that  the 
character  is  mercurial ;  yet  it  contains  elements  of 
stupendous  intensity  and  power  ;  and  this  you  feel, 
as   perhaps   you   may   never   have  felt    it    before, 

6 


82  The  Trip  to  England. 

when  you  look  at  such  works  as  the  Opera  House, 
the  Pantheon,  the  Madeleine,  the  Invaiides,  the 
Louvre,  the  Luxembourg,  and  the  stone  embank- 
ments which,  for  miles,  hem  in  the  Seine  on  both 
its  sides.  The  grandest  old  building  in  Paris  — 
also  a  living  witness  to  French  power  and  purpose 
—  is  the  church  of  Notre  Dame.  It  will  not  dis- 
place, in  the  affectionate  reverence  of  Americans, 
the  glory  of  Westminster  Abbey  ;  but  it  will  fill 
an  equal  place  in  their  memory.  Its  arches  are 
not  so  grand  ;  its  associations  are  not  so  near  and 
dear.  But  it  is  so  exceedingly  beautiful  in  forms 
and  in  simplicity  that  no  one  can  help  loving  it ; 
and  by  reason  of  certain  windings,  skilfully  devised, 
in  its  avenues,  it  is  invested  with  more  of  the 
alluring  attribute  of  mystery.  Some  of  its  asso- 
ciations, also,  are  especially  startling.  You  may 
there  see  the  chapel  in  which  Mary  Stuart  was  mar- 
ried to  her  first  husband,  then  Dauphin  of  France, 
and  in  which  Henry  the  Sixth,  of  England,  was 
crowned;  and  you  may  stand  on  the  very  spot  on 
which  Napoleon  Buonaparte  invested  himself  with 
the  imperial  diadem — ^  which,  with  his  own  hands, 
he  placed  on  his  own  head.  I  climbed  the  tower 
of  this  famous  cathedral,  and,  at  the  loftiest  attain- 
able height,  pictured  in  fancy  the  awful  closing 
scene  of  "  The  Hunchback  of  Notre  Dame."  That 
romance  seemed  the  truth  then,  and  Claude 
Frollo,  Esmeralda,  and  Quasimodo  were  as  real 
as  Richelieu.     There  is  a  vine  growina:  near  the 


A   Glimpse  of  Fiance.  83 

bell-tower,  and  some  children  were  at  play  there, 
on  the  stone  platform.  I  went  into  the  bell  and 
smote  upon  it  with  a  wooden  mallet,  and  heard 
with  delight  its  rich,  melodious,  soulful  music. 
The  four  hundred  steps  are  well  worn  that  lead  to 
the  tower  of  Notre  Dame.  There  are  few  places 
on  earth  so  fraught  with  memories  ;  few  that  so 
well  repay  the  homage  of  a  pilgrim  from  a  foreign 
land. 


IX. 


ENGLISH    HOME    SENTIMENT. 


''  I  "HE  elements  of  discontent  and  disturbance 
-*-  which  are  visible  in  English  society  are 
found,  upon  close  examination,  to  be  merely  su- 
perficial. Underneath  them  there  abides  a  sturdy, 
unshakeable,  inborn  love  of  England.  These 
croakings,  grumblings,  and  bickerings  do  but 
denote  the  process  by  which  the  body  politic 
frees  itself  from  the  headaches  and  fevers  that 
embarrass  the  national  health.  Tlie  Englishman 
and  his  country  are  one  ;  and  when  the  English- 
man complains  against  his  country  it  is  not  be- 
cause he  believes  that  either  there  is  or  can 
be  a  better  country  elsewhere,  but  because  his 
instinct   of  justice   and   order    makes    him    crave 


English  Home  Sentiment.  85 

perfection  in  liis  own.  Institutions  and  principles 
are,  with  liim,  by  nature,  paramount  to  indi- 
viduals ;  and  individuals  only  possess  importance 
—  and  that  conditional  on  abiding  rectitude  — 
who  are  their  representatives.  Everything  is  done 
in  England  to  promote  the  permanence  and  beauty 
of  the  home  ;  and  the  permanence  and  beauty 
of  the  home,  by  a  natural  reaction,  augment 
in  the  English  people  solidity  of  character  and 
peace  of  life.  They  do  not  dwell  in  a  per- 
petual fret  and  fume  as  to  the  acts,  thoughts,  and 
words  of  other  races  :  for  the  English  there  is 
absolutely  no  public  opinion  outside  of  their  ow^n 
land  :  they  do  not  live  for  the  sake  of  working, 
but  they  work  for  the  sake  of  living  ;  and,  as  the 
necessary  preparations  for  living  have  long  since 
been  completed,  their  country  is  at  rest.  This, 
it  seemed  to  me,  is  the  secret  of  England's  first, 
and  continuous,  and  last,  and  all-pervading  charm 
and  power  for  the  stranger  —  the  charm  and  power 
to  soothe.  As  long  as  the  world  lasts  England 
will  be  England  still. 

The  efficacy  of  endeavouring  to  make  a  country 
a  united,  comfortable,  and  beautiful  home  for  all 
its  inhabitants,  —  binding  every  heart  to  the  land 
by  the  same  tie  that  binds  every  heart  to  the 
fireside, — is  something  well  worthy  to  be  con- 
sidered, equally  by  the  practical  statesman  and 
the  contemplative  observer.  That  way,  assuredly, 
lies   the   welfare   of  the  human    race,  and   all  the 


86  The  Trip  to  England.  - 

tranquillity  that  human  nature  —  warped  as  it  is 
by  sin  —  will  ever  permit  to  this  world.  This 
endeavour  has,  through  long  ages,  been  steadily 
pursued  in  England,  and  one  of  its  results  — 
which  is  also  one  of  its  indications — is  the  vast 
accumulation  of  what  may  be  called  home  treas- 
ures, in  the  city  of  London.  The  mere  enume'ra- 
tion  of  them  would  fill  large  volumes.  The 
description  of  them  could  not  be  completed  in  a 
life-time.  It  was  this  copiousness  of  historic 
wealth  and  poetic  association,  combined  with  the 
flavour  of  character  and  the  sentiment  of  monastic 
repose,  that  bound  Dr.  Johnson  to  Fleet  street, 
and  made  Charles  Lamb  such  an  inveterate  lover 
of  the  town.  Except  it  be  to  correct  a  possible 
insular  narrowness,  there  can  be  no  need  that  the 
Londoner  should  travel.  Glorious  sights,  indeed, 
await  him,  if  he  journeys  no  further  away  than 
Paris  ;  but,  aside  from  ostentation,  luxury,  gaiety, 
and  excitement,  Paris  will  give  him  nothing  that 
he  may  not  find  at  home.  The  great  cathedral 
of  Notre  Dame  will  awe  him;  but  not  more  than 
his  own  Westminster  Abbey.  The  grandeur  and 
beauty  of  La  Madeleine  will  enchant  him  ;  but 
not  more  than  the  massive  solemnity  and  stupen- 
dous magnificence  of  St.  Paul's.  The  embank- 
ments of  the  Seine  will  satisfy  his  taste,  with  their 
symmetrical  solidity  ;  but  he  will  not  deem  them 
superior,  in  any  respect,  to  the  embankments  of 
the    Thames.      The     Pantheon,    tlie     Hotel     des 


English  Home  Sentiment.  87 

Invalides,  the  Luxemboarg,  the  Louvre,  the 
Tribunal  of  Commerce,  the  Opera  House, — all 
these  will  dazzle  and  delight  his  eyes,  arousing 
his  remembrances  of  history,  and  firing  his 
imagination  of  great  events  and  persons ;  but 
all  these  will  fail  to  displace  in  his  esteem  the 
grand  Palace  of  Westminster,  so  stalely  in  its 
simplicity,  so  strong  in  its  perfect  grace!  He 
will  ride  through  the  exquisite  Park  of  Monceau 
—  one  of  the  loveliest  spots  in  France  —  and  so 
onward  to  the  Bois  de  Boulogne,  witli  its  sump- 
tuous pomp  of  foliage,  its  romantic  green  vistas, 
its  multitudinous  winding  avenues,  its  hill-side 
hermitage,  its  cascades,  and  its  affluent  lakes, 
whereon  the  white  swans  beat  (he  water  with 
their  gladsome  w  ings ;  but  his  soul  will  still  turn, 
with  unshaken  love  and  loyal  preference,  to  the 
sweetly  sylvan  solitudes  of  tiie  Gardens  of  Kew. 
He  will  marvel,  in  the  museums  of  the  Louvre, 
the  Luxembourg,  and  Cluny;  and,  doubtless,  he 
will  freely  concede  that  in  paintings,  whether 
ancient  or  modern,  the  French  display  is  larger 
and  finer  than  the  English  ;  but  he  will  still 
vaunt  the  British  Museum  as  peerless  throughout 
the  world,  and  he  will  still  prize  his  National 
Gallery,  with  its  originals  of  Hogarth,  Reynolds, 
Gainsborough,  and  Turner,  its  spirited,  tender, 
and  dreamy  Murillos,  and  its  matchless  gems 
of  Rembrandt.  He  will  admire,  at  the  The'atre 
Franqais,  the  somewhat  unimaginative  and  photo- 


88  The  Trip  to  England. 

graphic  perfection  of  French  acting  ;  but  he  will 
be  apt  to  reflect  that  English  dramatic  art,  if 
it  often  lacks  finish,  sometimes  possesses  nature  ; 
and  he  will  certainly  perceive  tliat  the  play-house 
itself  is  not  to  be  compared  with  either  Her 
Majesty's  Theatre  or  Covent  Garden.  He  will 
luxuriate  in  the  Champs  Elysees,  in  the  su- 
perb Boulevards,  in  the  glittering  pageant  of  pre- 
cious jewels  that  blazes  in  the  Rue  de  Paix  and 
the  Palais  Royal,  and  in  that  gorgeous  panorama 
of  shop-windows  for  which  the  French  capital  is 
unrivaled  and  famous  ;  and  he  will  not  deny  that, 
as  to  brilliancy  of  aspect,  Paris  is  prodigious  and 
unequaled  —  the  most  radiant  of  cities  —  the  very 
male  sapphire  in  the  crown  of  King  Saul!  But, 
when  all  is  seen,  either  that  Louis  the  Fourteenth 
created  or  Buonaparte  pillaged,  —  when  he  has 
taken  his  last  walk  in  the  gardens  of  the  Tuileries, 
and  mused,  at  the  foot  of  the  statue  of  Cssar,  on 
that  Titanic  strife  of  monarchy  and  democracy,  of 
which  France  seems  destined  to  be  the  perpetual 
theatre,  —  sated  with  the  glitter  of  showy  opu- 
lence, and  tired  with  the  whirl  of  frivolous  life,  he 
will  gladly  and  gratefully  turn  again  to  his 
sombre,  mysterious,  thoughtful,  restful  old  Lon- 
don ;  and,  like  the  Syrian  captain,  though  in  the 
better  spirit  of  truth  and  right,  declare  that  Abana 
and  Pharpar,  rivers  of  Damascus,  are  better  than 
all  the  waters  of  Israel. 


X. 


LONDON  NOOKS  AND  CORNERS. 


'T^IIOSE  persons  upon  wliom  tlie  spirit  of  tlie 
-*-  past  has  power  —  and  it  has  not  power 
upon  every  mind! — are  aware  of  tlie  mysterious 
charm  that  invests  certain  famih'ar  spots  and 
objects,  in  all  old  cities.  London,  to  observers  of 
this  class,  is  a  never-ending  delight.  Modern 
cities,  for  the  most  part,  reveal  a  definite  and 
rather  a  common-place  design.  Their  main  ave- 
nues are  parallel.  Their  shorter  streets  bisect 
their  main  avenues.  They  are  diversified  with 
rectangular  squares.  Their  configuration,  in  brief, 
suggests  the  sapient,  utilitarian  forethought  of  the 
land-surveyor  and  civil  engineer.  The  ancient 
British  Capital,  on  the  contrary,  is  the  expression 


go  T/ie  Trip  io  England.  » 

—  slowly  and  often  narrowly  made  —  of  many 
thousands  of  characters.  It  is  a  city  that  has 
happened  —  and  the  stroller  through  the  old  part 
of  it  comes  continually  upon  the  queerest  imag- 
inable alleys,  courts,  and  nooks.  Not  far  from 
Drury  Lane  Theatre,  for  instance,  hidden  away 
in  a  clump  of  dingy  houses,  is  a  dismal  littl'e 
grave-yard  —  the  same  that  Dickens  has  chosen, 
in  his  novel  of  '■  Bleak  House,"  as  the  sepulchre 
of  little  Jo's  friend,  the  first  love  of  the  unfor- 
tunate Lady  D^lock.  It  is  a  doleful  spot,  draped 
in  the  robes  of  faded  sorrow,  and  crowded  into 
the  twilight  of  obscurity  by  the  thick-clustering 
habitations  of  men.  The  Cripplegate  church, — 
St.  Giles's — a  less  lugubrious  spot,  and  somewhat 
less  difficult  of  access,  is,  nevertheless,  strangely 
sequestered,  so  that  it  also  affects  the  observant 
eye  as  equally  one  of  the  surprises  of  London. 
I  saw  it,  for  the  first  time,  on  a  grey,  sad  Sunday, 
a  little  before  twilight,  and  when  the  service  was 
going  on  within  its  venerable,  historic  walls.  The 
footsteps  of  John  Milton  were  often  on  the  thresh- 
old of  the  Cripplegate,  and  his  grave  is  in  the 
nave  of  that  ancient  church.  A  simple  flat  stone 
marks  that  sacred  spot,  and  many  a  heedless  foot 
tramples  over  that  hallowed  dust.  From  Golden 
Lane,  which  is  close  by,  you  can  see  the  octagon 
tower  of  this  church  ;  and,  as  you  walk  from  the 
place  where  Milton  lived  to  the  place  where  his 
ashes    repose,   you    seem,    with    a    solemn,    awe- 


London  Nooks  and  Corners.  «;i 

stricken  emotion,  to  be  actually  following  in  liis 
funeral  train.  The  grave  of  Daniel  De  Foe,  for- 
ever memorable  as  the  autlior  of  the  great  and 
wonderful  romance  of"  Robinson  Crusoe,"  is  also 
in  tlie  Cripplcu-ate  ;  and  at  its  altar  occurred  the 
marriage  of  Oliver  Cromwell.  I  remembered  — 
as  I  stood  there  and  conjured  up  that  scene  of 
golden  joy  and  hope  —  the  place  of  the  Lord  Pro- 
tector's coronation  in  Westminster  Hall ;  the  place, 
still  marked,  in  Westminster  Abbey,  where  his 
body  was  buried  ;  and  old  Temple  Bar,  on  which 
[if  not  on  Westminster  Hall  itself]  his  mutilated 
corse  was  finally  e.xposed  to  the  blind  rage  of  the 
fickle  populace.  A  little  time  —  a  very  little  time  — 
serves  to  gather  up  equally  the  happiness  and  the 
anguish,  the  conquest  and  the  defeat,  the  greatness 
and  the  littleness  of  human  life,  and  to  cover  them 
all  with  silence. 

But  not  always  with  oblivion.  These  quaint 
churches,  and  many  other  mouldering  relics  of 
the  past,  in  London,  are  haunted  witii  associations 
that  never  can  perish  out  of  remembrance.  In 
fact,  the  whole  of  the  old  city  impresses  you  as 
densely  invested  with  an  atmosphere  of  human 
experience,  dark,  sad,  and  lamentable.  Walking, 
alone,  in  ancient  quarters  of  it,  after  midnight  — as 
I  often  did  —  I  was  aware  of  the  oppressive  sense 
of  tragedies  that  have  been  acted,  and  misery  that 
has  been  endured,  in  its  dusky  streets  and  melan- 
choly houses.     They  do  not  err  who  say  that  the 


92  The  Trip  to  England.  * 

spiritual  life  of  man  leaves  its  influence  in  the 
physical  objects  by  which  he  is  surrounded. 
Night-walks  in  London  will  teach  you  that,  if  they 
teach  you  nothing  else.  I  went  more  than  once 
into  Brook  street,  Holborn,  and  traced  the  desolate 
footsteps  of  poor  Thomas  Chatterton  to  the  scene 
of  his  self-murder  and  agonized,  pathetic,  deplorr 
able  death.  It  is  more  than  a  century  [1770],  since 
that  "marvellous  boy"  was  driven  to  suicide  by 
neglect,  hunger,  and  despair.  They  are  tearing 
down  the  houses  on  one  side  of  Brook  street  now, 
[1877]  ;  it  is  doubtful  which  house  was  No.  39,  in 
the  attic  of  which  Chatterton  died,  and  doubtful 
whether  it  remains  :  his  grave  —  a  pauper's  grave, 
which  was  made  in  a  work-house  burial-ground,  in 
Shoe  Lane,  long  since  obliterated  —  is  unknown; 
but  his  presence  hovers  about  that  region  ;  liis 
strange  and  touching  story  tinges  its  squalour  and 
its  commonness  with  the  mystical  moonlight  of 
romance  ;  and  his  name  is  blended  with  it  forever. 
On  another  night  I  walked  from  St.  James's 
Palace  to  Whitehall  (the  York  Place  of  Cardinal 
Wolsey),  over  the  ground  that  Charles  the  First 
must  have  traversed,  on  his  way  to  the  scaffold. 
The  story  of  the  murder  of  that  king,  always  sorrow- 
ful to  remember,  is  very  grievous  to  consider,  when 
you  realize,  upon  the  actual  scene  of  his  ordeal  and 
death,  his  exalted  fortitude  and  his  bitter  agony. 
It  seemed  as  if  I  could  almost  hear  his  voice,  as  it 
sounded  on  that  fateful  morning,  asking  that  his 


London  Nooks  and  Corners.  93 

body  might  be  more  thickly  clad,  lest,  in  the  cold, 
January  air,  he  should  shiver,  and  so,  before  the 
eyes  of  his  enemies,  should  seem  to  be  trembling 
with  fear.  The  Puritans,  having  brought  this 
poor  man  to  the  place  of  execution,  kept  him  in 
suspense  from  early  morning  till  after  two  o'clock 
in  the  day,  wliile  tliey  debated  over  a  proposition 
to  spare  his  life  —  upon  any  condition  they  might 
choose  to  make  —  which  had  been  sent  to  them  by 
his  son,  Prince  Charles.  Old  persons  were  alive 
in  London,  not  very  long  ago,  who  remembered 
having  seen,  in  their  childhood,  the  window,  in 
the  end  of  Whitehall,  through  which  the  doomed 
monarch  walked  forth  to  the  block.  It  was  long 
ago  walled  up,  and  the  palace  has  undergone 
much  alteration  since  tlie  days  of  the  Stuarts  ;  but 
the  spot,  in  the  rear  of  Whiteliall,  where  the  king 
was  butchered,  is  marked  to  this  day,  in  a  man- 
ner most  tenderly  significant.  A  bronze  statue  of 
his  son,  James  the  Second,  stands  in  this  place. 
It  is  by  Roubiliac  (whose  marbles  are  numerous,  in 
the  Abbey  and  elsewhere  in  London,  and  whose 
grave  is  in  St.  Martin's  Church),  and  it  is  one  of 
the  most  graceful  works  of  that  spirited  sculptor. 
The  figure  is  slender,  elegant,  and  beautifully 
modelled.  The  face  is  downcast  and  full  of  <rrief 
and  reproach.  The  right  hand  points,  with  a 
truncheon,  toward  the  earth.  It  is  impossible  to 
mistake  the  ruminant,  melancholy  meaning  of  this 
memorial ;  and,  equally,  it  is  impossible  to  walk, 


94  The  Trip  to  England. 

without  both  thought  that  instructs  and  emotion  that 
elevates,  through  a  city  which  thus  abounds  with 
traces  of  momentous  incident  and  representative 
experience. 

The  literary  pilgrim  in  London  has  this  double 
advantage  —  that,  while  he  communes  with  the 
past,  he  may  enjoy  in  the  present.  Yesterday 
and  to-day  are  commingled  here,  in  a  way  that  is 
almost  ludicrous.  When  you  turn  from  Roubil- 
iac's  statue  of  James,  your  eyes  rest  upon  the 
retired  house  of  Disraeli.  If  you  walk  past 
Whitehall,  toward  the  Palace  of  Westminster, 
some  friend  may  chance  to  tell  you  how  the  great 
Duke  of  Wellington  walked  there,  in  the  feeble- 
ness of  his  age,  from  the  Horse  Guards  to  the 
House  of  Lords  ;  and  with  what  pleased  compla- 
cency the  old  warrior  used  to  boast  of  his  skill  in 
threading  a  crowded  thoroughfare,  —  unaware  that 
the  police,  acting  by  particular  orders,  were  wont 
to  protect  his  reverend  person  from  errant  cabs 
and  pushing  pedestrians.  As  I  strolled,  one  day, 
past  Lambeth  Palace,  on  the  road  to  Dulwich, 
it  happened  that  the  palace  gates  were  suddenly 
unclosed,  and  that  His  Grace  the  Archbishop  of 
Canterbury — a  little,  fat,  sleek  prelate,  in  black 
garments  —  came  riding  forth,  on  horseback,  from 
this  Episcopal  residence,  and  pranced  away  toward 
the  House  of  Lords.  It  is  the  same  arched  gate- 
way  through  which,  in  other  days,  passed  out  the 
stately  train  of  Wolsey.     It  is  the  same  towered 


London  Nooks  and  Cor  nets.  95 

palace  that  Queen  Elizabeth  must  have  looked 
upon  (and  that  was  the  last  civic  habitation  she 
could  have  seen,  upon  the  Surrey  side  of  the 
Thames),  as  her  barge  swept  past,  on  its  watery 
track  to  Richmond.  It  is  forever  associated  with 
the  memory  of  the  great  Thomas  Cromwell.  In 
the  church,  hard  by,  rest  the  ashes  of  men  distin- 
guished in  the  most  diverse  directions — Ducrow, 
the  equestrian  actor ;  Jackson,  the  clown  ;  and 
Tennison,  the  arciibisliop,  the  "honest,  prudent, 
labourious,  and  benevolent"  primate  of  William 
the  Third,  who  was  thought  worthy  to  succeed  in 
office  the  illustrious  Tillotson.  The  cure  of  souls  is 
sought  here  with  just  as  vigourous  energy  as  when 
Tillotson  wooed  by  his  goodness  and  charmed  by 
his  matchless  eloquence.  Not  a  great  distance 
from  this  spot  you  come  upon  the  college  at  Dul- 
wich,  that  Edward  Alleyn  founded,  in  the  time  of 
Shakespeare,  and  that  still  subsists,  upon  the  old 
actor's  endowment.  It  is  said  that  Alleyn  —  who 
was  a  man  of  fortune,  and  whom  a  contemporary 
epigram  styles  the  best  actor  of  his  day  —  gained 
the  most  of  his  money  by  the  exhibition  of  bears. 
But,  howsoever  gained,  he  made  a  good  use  of  it. 
His  tomb  is  in  the  centre  of  the  college.  Here 
may  be  seen  one  of  the  rarest  picture-galleries  in 
England.  One  of  the  cherished  paintings  in  this 
collection  is  the  famous  portrait,  by  Sir  Joshua 
Reynolds,  of  Mrs.  Siddons  as  the  Tragic  Muse  — re- 
markaljlc  for  its  colour,  and  splendidly  expositive  of 


96 


The  Trip  to  England. 


the  boldness  of  feature,  brilliancy  of  countenance, 
and  stately  grace  of  posture  for  which  its  original 
was  distinguished.  Another  represents  two  re- 
nowned beauties  of  their  day  —  the  Linley  sisters — 
who  became  Mrs.  Sheridan  and  Mrs.  Tickel.  You 
do  not  wonder,  as  you  look  upon  these  fair  faces, 
sparkling  with  health,  arch  with  merriment,  lambent 
with  sensibility,  and  soft  with  goodness  and  feel- 
ing, that  Sheridan  should  have  fought  duels,  for 
such  a  prize  as  the  lady  of  his  love  ;  or  that  these 
fascinating  creatures,  favoured  ahke  by  the  Graces 
and  the  Muse,  should,  in  their  gentle  lives,  have 
been,  "like  Juno's  swans,  coupled  and  insepara- 
ble." Mary,  Mrs.  Tickel,  died  first ;  and  Moore, 
in  his  "  Life  of  Sheridan,"  has  preserved  a  lament 
for  her,  written  by  Eliza,  Mrs.  Sheridan,  which  — 
for  deep,  true  sorrow,  and  melodious  eloquence  — 
is  almost  worthy  to  be  named  with  Thomas  Tickel's 
monody  on  Addison,  or  Cowper's  memorial  lines  on 
his  mother's  picture  :  — 

"  Shall  all  the  wisdom  of  the  world  combined 
Erase  thy  image,  Mary,  from  my  mind, 
Or  bid  me  liope  from  others  to  receive 
The  fond  affection  thou  alone  could  'st  give.' 
Ah  no,  my  best  beloved,  thou  still  shalt  be 
My  friend,  my  sister,  all  the  world  to  me !  " 

Precious  also  among  the  gems  of  the  Dulwich 
gallery  are  certain  excellent  specimens  of  the  gentle, 
dreamy  style  of  Murillo.  The  pilgrim  passes  on, 
by  a  short  drive,  to  Sydenham,  and  dines  at  the 


LondoJi  Nooks  and  Corners.  (j-j 

Crystal  Palace  —  and  still  he  finds  the  faces  of  the 
past  and  the  present  confronted,  in  a  manner  that  is 
almost  comic.  Nothing  could  be  more  aptly  repre- 
sentative of  the  practical,  showy  phase  of  the  spirit 
of  to-day  than  is  this  enormous,  opulent,  and  glitter- 
ing '•  palace  made  of  windows."  Yet,  I  saw  here 
the  carriage  in  which  Napoleon  Buonaparte  used 
to  drive,  at  St.  Helena  —  a  vehicle  as  sombre  and 
ghastly  as  were  the  broken  fortunes  of  its  death- 
stricken  master;  "and,  sitting  at  the  next  table  to 
my  own,  I  saw  the  son  of  Buonaparte's  great  de- 
fender, William  Hazlitt. 

It  was  a  grey  and  misty  evening.  The  plains 
below  the  palace  terraces  were  veiled  in  shadow, 
tlirough  which,  here  and  there,  twinkled  the  lights 
of  some  peaceful  villa.  Far  away  the  spires  and 
domes  of  London,  dimly  seen,  pierced  the  city's 
nightly  pall  of  smoke.  It  was  a  dream  too  sweet 
to  last.  It  ended  when  all  the  illuminations  were 
burnt  out ;  when  the  myriads  of  red  and  green  and 
yellow  stars  had  fallen  ;  and  all  the  silver  fountains 
had  ceased  to  play. 


XI. 


THE   TOWER   AND  THE  BYRON  MEMORIAL. 


T  ON  DON,  July  15th,  1877.  — The  Tower  of 
-*— '  London  is  degraded  by  being  put  to  com- 
monplace uses,  and  by  being  exhibited  in  a  com- 
monplace manner.  They  use  the  famous  White 
Tower,  now,  as  a  store-house  for  arms,  and  it  con- 
tains at  this  minute  102,000  guns,  in  perfect  order, 
besides  a  vast  collection  of  old  armour  and  weap- 
ons. The  arrangement  of  the  latter  was  made  by 
J.  R.  Planche,  the  dramatic  author, — famous  as 
an  antiquarian  and  a  herald.  [This  learned,  able, 
brilliant,  and  honoured  gentleman  died,  May  29th, 
1880,  aged  84  years.]  Under  his  tasteful  direc- 
tion the  effigies  and  gear  of  chivalry  are  displayed 
in  such  a  way   that   the  observer  may   trace   the 


The  Tower  and  the  Byron  Memorial.     99 

changes  which  war  fashions  have  undergone,  tlirough 
the  reigns  of  successive  sovereigns  of  England,  from 
the  earliest  period  until  now.  A  suit  of  armour  worn 
by  Henry  the  Eighth  is  shown,  and  also  a  suit  worn 
by  Charles  the  First.  The  suggestiveness  of  both 
figures  is  remarkable.  In  a  room  on  the  second 
floor  of  the  White  Tower  they  keep  many  gorgeous 
oriental  weapons,  and  they  show  the  cloak  in  which 
General  Wolfe  died,  on  the  Plains  of  Abraliam.  It 
is  a  grey  garment,  to  which  the  active  moth  has  given 
a  share  of  his  personal  attention.  The  most  im- 
pressive objects  to  be  seen  here,  however,  are  the 
block  and  a.\e  tliat  were  used  in  beheading  the  traitor 
lords,  Kilmarnock,  Lovat,  and  Balmerino,  after  the 
defeat  of  tlie  Pretender,  in  1745.  The  block  is  of 
ash,  and  there  are  big  and  cruel  dents  upon  it,  which 
show  that  it  was  made  for  use  rather  than  orna- 
ment. It  is  harmless  enough  now,  and  this  writer 
was  allowed  to  place  his  head  upon  it,  in  the 
manner  prescribed  for  the  victims  of  decapitation. 
The  door  of  Raleigh's  bedroom  is  opposite  to  these 
baleful  relics,  and  it  is  said  that  his  "  History  of 
the  World "  was  written  in  the  room  in  which 
these  implements  are  now  such  conspicuous  ob- 
jects of  gloom.  The  whole  place  is  gloomy  and 
cheerless  beyond  expression,  and  great  must  have 
been  the  fortitude  of  the  man  who  bore,  in  this 
grim  solitude,  a  captivity  of  thirteen  years  —  not 
failing  to  turn  it  to  the  best  account,  by  produ- 
cing a  book  so  excellent  for  quaintness,  philosophy, 


100  The  Trip  to  England. 

and  eloquence.  A  ridiculous  "  beef-eater,"  ar- 
rayed in  a  dark  tunic  and  trousers  trimmed  with 
red,  and  a  black  velvet  hat  trimmed  with  bows 
of  blue  and  red  ribbon,  precedes  each  group  of 
visitors,  and  drops  information  and  h's,  from  point 
to  point.  "  The  'ard  fate  of  the  Hurl  of  Hessex  " 
was  found  to  be  a  particularly  fascinating  topifc 
with  one  of  these  functionaries;  and  very  hard  it 
was  —  for  the  listener  as  well  as  the  language  — 
when  standing  on  the  spot  where  that  poor  gen- 
tleman lost  his  life,  by  the  mad  spite  of  Queen 
Elizabeth  and  the  treacherous  enmity  of  Raleigh 
and  Cecil,  to  hear  his  name  so  persecuted.  This 
spot  is  in  the  centre  of  what  was  once  the  Tower 
Green,  and  it  is  marked  with  a  brass  jDlate,  nam- 
ing Anne  Boleyn,  and  giving  the  date  when  she 
was  there  beheaded.  They  found  her  body  in  an 
elm-wood  box,  made  to  hold  arrows,  and  it  now 
rests,  with  the  ashes  of  other  noble  sufferers,  un- 
der the  stones  of  the  chapel  of  St.  Peter,  about 
fifty  feet  from  the  place  of  execution.  The  ghost 
of  Anne  Boleyn  is  said  to  haunt  that  part  of  the 
Tower  where  she  lived,  and  it  is  likewise  said 
that  the  spectre  of  Lady  Jane  Grey  was  seen,  not 
long  ago,  on  the  anniversary  of  the  day  of  her 
execution  [Obt.  1554],  to  ghde  out  upon  a  balcony 
adjacent  to  the  room  she  is  believed  to  have  occu- 
pied, at  the  last  of  her  wasted,  unfortunate  life.  It 
could  serve  no  good  purpose  to  relate  the  particu- 
lars of  these  visitations ;  but  nobody  doubts  them 


The  To7uer  and  the  Byron  ^f■morial.      loi 

—  while  he  is  in  the  Tower.  It  is  ;x  place  id  mys- 
tery and  horror,  notwithstanding  all  that  the  prac- 
tical spirit  of  to-day  can  do,  and  has  done,  to  make 
it  common  and  to  cheapen  its  grim  glories. 

The  Byron  Memorial  Loan  Collection,  which 
was  displayed  at  the  .Albert  Memorial  Hall,  did  not 
attract  what,  in  America,  would  be  considered  much 
attention.  Yet  it  was  a  vastly  impressive  show  of 
relics.  The  catalogue  names  seventy-four  objects, 
and  thirty-nine  designs  for  a  monument  to  Byron. 
The  design  which  has  been  chosen  presents  a 
seated  figure,  of  the  young  sailor-boy  type.  The 
right  hand  supports  the  chin  ;  the  left,  resting  on 
the  left  knee,  holds  an  open  book  and  a  pencil. 
The  dress  consists  of  a  loose  shirt,  open  at  the 
collar  and  down  tlie  bosom,  a  flowing  neck-cloth, 
and  wide,  sailor-like  trousers.  Byron's  dog,  Boat- 
swain—  commemorated  in  the  well-known  epitaph, 

"  To  mark  a  friend's  remains  these  stones  arise, 
I  never  knew  but  one,  and  here  he  lies  "  — 

is  shown,  in  effigy,  at  the  poet's  feet.  The  treat- 
ment of  the  subject,  in  this  model,  certainly  deserves 
to  be  called  free,  but  the  general  eflTect  of  the  work 
is  finical.  The  statue  will,  probably,  be  popular; 
but  it  will  give  no  adequate  idea  of  the  man.  Byron 
was  both  massive  and  intense  ;  and  this  image  is 
no  more  than  tlie  usual  hero  of  nautical  romance. 
[It  was  dedicated,  in  London,  in  May,  i8So]. 

It  was  the  relic  department,  however,  and  not 
the  statuary,  that  more  attracted  notice.     The  rel- 


I02  The  Trip  to  England. 

ics  were  exhibited  in  three  glass  cases,  exclusive 
of  large  portraits.  It  is  impossible,  by  written 
words,  to  make  tlie  reader  —  supposing  him  to 
revere  this  great  poet's  genius,  and  to  care  for 
his  memory  —  feel  the  thrill  of  emotion  that  was 
aroused,  by  actual  sight,  and  almost  actual  touch,  of 
objects  so  intimately  associated  with  the  livin* 
Byron.  Five  pieces  of  his  hair  were  shown,  one 
of  which  was  cut  off,  after  his  death,  by  Captain 
Trelawny  —  the  remarkable  gentleman  who  says 
that  he  uncovered  the  legs  of  the  corse,  in  order  to 
ascertain  the  nature  and  extent  of  their  deformity. 
All  these  locks  of  hair  are  faded,  and  all  present  a 
mixture  of  grey  and  brown.  Byron's  hair  was  not, 
seemingly,  of  a  fine  texture,  and  it  appears  to  have 
turned  grey  early  in  life.  These  tresses  were  lent 
to  the  exhibition,  by  Lady  Dorchester,  Mr.  John 
Murray,  the  Rev.  H.  M.  Robinson,  D.  D.,  and 
E.  J.  Trelawny.  A  strangely  interesting  memorial 
was  a  little  locket  of  plain  gold,  shaped  like  a  heart, 
which  Byron  habitually  wore.  Near  to  this  was  the 
crucifix  found  in  his  room  at  Missolonghi,  after  his 
death.  It  is  about  ten  inches  long,  and  is  made  of 
ebony.  A  small  bronze  figure  of  Christ  is  dis- 
played upon  it,  and  at  the  feet  of  this  figure  are 
cross-bones  and  a  skull,  of  the  same  metal.  A 
glass  beaker,  which  Byron  gave  to  his  butler,  in 
1815,  attracted  attention  by  its  portly  size,  and,  to 
the  profane  fanc}',  hinted  that  his  lordship  had 
formed  a  liberal  estimate  of  the  butler's  powers  of 


The  Tourer  and  the  Byron  Memorial.     103 

suction.  Four  articles  of  head-gear  occupied  a 
prominent  place  in  one  of  the  cabinets.  Two  are 
helmets  that  Hyron  wore  when  he  was  in  Greece, 
in  1S24  —  and  very  cjueer  must  have  been  his 
appearance  when  he  wore  them.  One  is  light 
blue,  the  other  dark  green  ;  both  are  faded  ;  both 
are  fierce  with  brass  ornaments,  and  barbaric 
with  brass  scales  like  those  of  a  snake.  A  come- 
lier  object  is  the  poet's  "boarding-cap," — a  leathern 
slouch,  turned  up  with  green  velvet  and  studded 
with  brass  nails.  Many  small  articles  of  Byron's 
property  were  scattered  through  the  cases.  A 
corpulent  little  silver  watch,  with  Arabic  numer- 
als upon  its  face,  and  a  meerschaum  pipe,  not 
much  coloured,  were  among  them.  The  cap  that 
he  sometimes  wore,  during  the  last  years  of 
his  life,  and  that  is  depicted  in  the  well-known 
sketch  of  him  by  Count  D'Orsay,  was  exhibited, 
and  so  was  D'Orsay"s  portrait.  The  cap  is  of 
green  velvet,  not  much  tarnished,  and  is  sur- 
rounded by  a  gold  band  and  faced  by  an  ugly 
vizor.  The  face,  in  the  sketch,  is  supercilious  and 
cruel.  A  better  and  obviously  truer  sketch  is  that 
made  by  Cattermole,  which  also  was  in  this  ex- 
hibition. Strength  in  despair  and  a  dauntless 
spirit  that  shines  through  the  ravages  of  irreme- 
diable suffering  are  the  qualities  of  this  portrait; 
and  they  make  it  marvellously  effective.  Thor- 
waldsen's  fine  bust  of  Byron,  made  for  Hobhouse, 
and  also  the  celebrated   Phillips  portrait  —  which 


I04  The  lYip  io  England. 

Scott  said  was  the  best  likeness  of  Bjron  ever 
painted  —  occupied  places  in  this  group.  The  copy 
of  the  New  Testament  which  Lady  Byron  gave  to 
her  husband,  and  which  he,  in  turn,  presented  to 
Lady  Caroline  Lamb,  was  there,  and  is  a  pocket 
volume,  bound  in  black  leather,  with  the  inscrip- 
tion, "From  a  sincere  and  anxious  friend,"  wrif- 
ten,  in  a  stiff,  formal  hand,  across  the  fly-leaf.  A 
gold  ring  that  the  poet  constantly  wore,  and  the 
collar  of  his  dog  Boatswain  —  a  discoloured  band 
of  brass,  with  sharply  jagged  edges — should  also 
be  named,  as  among  the  most  interesting  of  the 
relics. 

But  the  most  remarkable  objects  of  all  were  the 
manuscripts.  These  comprise  the  original  draft  of 
the  third  canto  of  "Childe  Harold,"  written  on  odd 
bits  of  paper,  during  Byron's  journey  from  London 
to  Venice,  in  iSl6;  the  first  draft  of  the  fourth 
canto,  together  with  a  clean  copy  of  it ;  the  notes 
to  "Marino  Faliero ; "  the  concluding  stage  direc- 
tions—  much  scrawled  and  blotted  —  in  "Heaven 
and  Earth;"  a  document  concerning  the  poet's 
matrimonial  trouble  ;  and  about  fifteen  of  his  let- 
ters. The  passages  seen  are  those  beginning 
"  Since  my  young  days  of  passion,  joy,  or  pain ; " 
"  To  bear  unhurt  what  time  cannot  abate  ;  "  and,  in 
canto  fourth,  the  stanzas  from  ii8  to  129  inclusive. 
The  writing  is  free  and  strong,  and  it  still  remains 
entirely  legible,  although  the  paper  is  yellow  with 
age.     Altogether,  these  relics  were  toucliingly  sig- 


The  Tower  and  the  Byron  Memorial.     105 

nificant  of  the  strange,  flark.  sari  career  of  a  wonder- 
tiil  man.  Vet,  as  already  said,  they  attracted  but 
little  notice.  The  memory  of  Byron  seems  dark- 
ened, as  with  the  taint  of  lunacy.  "  He  did  strange 
things,"  one  Englishman  said  to  me;  "and  there 
was  something  queer  about  him."  The  London 
house,  in  which  he  was  born,  in  Holies  street, 
Cavendish  square,  is  marked  with  a  tablet  —  ac- 
cording to  a  custom  instituted  by  a  society  of  arts 
—  and  that  is  about  all  the  visible  memorial  to  him 
in  London.  The  houses  in  which  he  lived,  Xo.  8 
St.  James  street,  near  the  old  Palace,  and  Xo.  13 
Piccadilly  terrace,  are  not  marked.  The  latter  is 
now  a  chemist's  shop,  while  the  house  of  his  birth 
is  occupied  by  a  descendant  of  Elizabeth  Fry,  the 
"  philanthropist." 

The  custom  of  marking  the  houses  associated 
with  great  names  is,  obviously,  a  good  one,  and 
it  ought  to  be  adopted  in  our  country.  Two  build- 
ings here,  one  in  Westminster  and  one  in  the 
grounds  of  the  South  Kensington  Museum,  bear 
the  name  of  Franklin  ;  and  I  also  saw  memorial 
tablets  to  Drvden  and  Burke,  in  Gerrard  street,  to 
Mrs.  Siddons,  in  Baker  street,  to  Sir  Joshua  Rey- 
nolds, in  Leicester  square,  opposite  to  the  Alham- 
bra,  to  Garrick,  in  the  Adelphi  terrace,  to  Louis 
Napoleon,  and  to  many  other  renowned  individuals. 
The  room  that  Sir  Joshua  occupied  as  a  studio  is 
now  an  auction  mart.  The  stone  stairs  leading  up  to 
it  are  much  worn,  but  remain  as  they  were  when, 


io6  The  Trip  to  England. 

it  may  be  imagined,  Burke,  Johnson,  Goldsmith, 
Langton,  Beauclerk,  and  Boswell  walked  there,  on 
many  a  festive  night  in  the  old  times. 

It  is  a  breezy,  slate-coloured  evening  in  July.  I 
look  from  the  window  of  a  London  house  which 
fronts  a  spacious  park.  Those  great  elms,  which 
Birket  Foster  draws  so  well,  and  which,  in  then- 
wealth  of  foliage  and  irregular  and  pompous  ex- 
panse of  limb,  are  finer  than  all  other  trees  of 
their  class,  fill  the  prospect,  and  nod  and  murmur 
in  the  wind.  Through  a  rift  in  their  heavy-laden 
boughs  is  visible  a  long  vista  of  green  field,  in 
which  some  children  are  at  play.  Their  laughter, 
and  the  rustle  of  leaves,  with  now  and  then  the 
click  of  a  horse's  hoofs  upon  the  road  near  by, 
make  up  the  music  of  this  summer  eve.  The  sky 
is  a  little  overcast,  but  not  gloomy.  As  I  muse 
upon  this  delicious  scene,  the  darkness  slowly 
gathers,  the  stars  come  out,  and  presently  the  moon 
rises,  and  blanches  the  meadow  with  silver  light. 
This  has  been  the  English  summer,  with  scarce  a 
touch  of  either  heat  or  storm. 


XII. 


WESTMINSTER   AEREY. 


IT  is  strange  that  the  life  of  the  past,  in  its  unfa- 
miliar remains  and  fading  traces,  should  so  far 
surpass  the  life  of  the  present,  in  impressive  force 
and  influence.  Human  characteristics,  although 
manifested  under  widely  different  conditions,  were 
the  same  in  old  timesthat  they  are  now.  It  is  not 
in  them,  surely,  that  we  are  to  seek  for  the  myste- 
rious charm  which  hallows  ancient  objects  and  the 
historical  antiquities  of  the  world.  There  is  many 
a  venerable,  weather-stained  church  in  London,  at 
sight  of  which  your  steps  falter  and  your  thoughts 
take  a  wistful,  melancholy  turn  —  though  then  you 
may  not  know  either  who  built  it.  or  who  has  wor- 
shipped in  it,  or  what  dust  of  the  dead  is  moulder- 
ing in  its  vaults.     The  spirit  which  thus  instantly 


io8  The  Trip  to  England. 

possesses  and  controls  you  is  not  one  of  associa- 
tion, but  is  inherent  in  the  place.  Time's  shadow 
on  the  works  of  man,  like  moonlight  on  a  land- 
scape, gives  only  graces  to  the  view  —  tingeingthem, 
the  while,  with  sombre  sheen  —  and  leaves  all  blem- 
ishes in  darkness.  This  may  suggest  the  reason  that 
relics  of  by-gone  years  so  sadly  please  and  strange- 
ly awe  us,  in  the  passing  moment ;  or,  it  may  be 
that  we  involuntarily  contrast  their  apparent  perma- 
nence with  our  own  evanescent  mortality,  and  so 
are  dejected  with  a  sentiment  of  dazed  helplessness 
and  solemn  grief.  This  sentiment  it  is  —  allied  to 
bereaved  love  and  a  natural  wish  for  remembrance 
after  death — that  has  filled  Westminster  Abbey, 
and  many  another  holy  mausoleum,  with  sculptured 
memorials  of  the  departed  ;  and  this,  perhaps,  is  the 
subtile  power  that  makes  us  linger  beside  them, 
"  with  thoughts  beyond  the  reaches  of  our  souls." 

When  the  gentle  old  angler  Izaak  Walton  went 
into  Westminster  Abbey  to  visit  the  grave  of  Ca- 
saubon,  he  scratched  his  initials  on  his  friend's 
monument— where  the  record,  "  I.  W.,  1658,"  may 
still  be  read,  by  the  stroller  in  Poets'  Corner.  One 
might  well  wish  to  follow  that  example,  and  even 
thus  to  associate  his  name  with  the  great  cathe- 
dral. And  not  in  pride,  but  in  humble  reverence! 
Here,  if  anywhere  on  earth,  self-assertion  is  re- 
buked and  human  eminence  set  at  naught.  Among 
all  the  impressions  that  crowd  upon  the  mind,  in 
this  wonderful  place,  that  which  oftenest  recurs  and 


Weslmins/cr  Abbey.  109 

longest  remains,  is  the  impression  of  man's  individ- 
ual insi^^nificance.  This  is  salutary,  but  it  is  also 
dark.  'I'liere  can  be  no  enjoyment  of  the  Abbey 
till,  after  much  communion  with  the  spirit  of  the 
place,  your  soul  is  soothed  by  its  beauty  rather  than 
overwhelmed  by  its  majesty,  and  your  mind  ceases 
from  the  vain  effort  to  grasp  and  interpret  its  tre- 
mendous meaning.  You  cannot  long  endure,  and 
you  never  can  express,  the  sense  of  grandeur  that 
is  inspired  by  Westminster  Abbey  ;  but,  when  at 
length  its  shrines  and  tombs  and  statues  become 
familiar,  when  its  chapels,  aisles,  arches,  and  clois- 
ters are  grown  companionable,  and  you  can  stroll 
and  dream  undismayed  "  through  rows  of  warriors 
and  through  walks  of  kings,''  tliere  is  no  limit  to 
the  pensive  memories  they  awaken  and  the  poetic 
fancies  they  prompt.  In  this  church  are  buried, 
amidst  generations  of  their  nobles  and  courtiers, 
fourteen  monarchs  of  England  —  beginning  with 
the  Saxon  Sebert  and  ending  with  George  the  Sec- 
ond. Fourteen  queens  rest  here,  and  many  chil- 
dren of  the  royal  blood  who  never  came  to  the 
throne.  Here,  confronted  in  a  haughty  rivalry  of 
solemn  pomp,  rise  the  equal  tombs  of  Elizabeth 
Tudor  and  ]Mary  Stuart.  Queen  Eleanor's  dust  is 
here  (who  still  slays  Fair  Rosamond  in  the  ancient 
ballad),  and  here,  too,  is  the  dust  of  the  grim 
Queen  Mary.  In  one  little  nook  you  may  pace, 
with  but  half  a  dozen  steps,  across  the  graves  of 
Charles  the  Second,  William  and  IMary,  and  Queen 


no  The  IVip  io  England.  ' 

Anne  and  her  consort  Prince  George.  At  the  tomb 
of  Henry  the  Fifth  you  may  see  the  hehnet,  shield, 
and  saddle  which  were  worn  by  tliat  valiant  youn"- 
king,  at  Agincourt  ;  and  close  by  — on  the  tomb 
of  Margaret  Woodeville,  daughter  of  Edward  the 
Fourth  — the  sword  and  shield  that  were  borne,  in 
royal  state,  before  the  great  Edward  the  Third,  500 
years  ago.  The  princes  whom  Richard  murdered 
in  the  Tower  are  commemorated  here,  by  an  altar, 
set  up  by  Charles  the  Second,  whereon  the  inscrip- 
tion—  blandly  and  almost  humourously  oblivious  of 
the  incident  of  Cromwell  — states  that  it  was  erected 
in  the  thirtieth  year  of  Charles's  reign.  Richard 
the  Second,  deposed  and  assassinated,  is  here  en- 
tombed ;  and  within  a  few  feet  of  him  are  the  relics 
of  his  uncle,  the  able  and  powerful  Duke  of  Glouces- 
ter, whom  so  treacherously  he  ensnared,  and  be- 
trayed to  death.  Here  also,  huge,  rough,  and  grey, 
is  the  marble  sarcophagus  of  Edward  the  First, 
which,  when  opened,  more  than  a  hundred  years 
ago,  disclosed  the  skeleton  of  departed  majesty, 
still  perfect,  wearing  robes  of  gold  tissue  and  crim- 
son velvet,  and  having  a  crown  on  the  head  and  a 
sceptre  in  the  hand.  So  sleep,  in  jeweled  darkness 
and  gaudy  decay,  what  once  were  monarchs!  And 
all  around  are  great  lords,  sainted  prelates,  famous 
statesmen,  renowned  soldiers,  and  illustrious  poets. 
Burleigh,  Pitt,  Fox,  Burke,  Canning,  Newton,  Bar- 
row, Wilberforce  —  names  forever  glorious!  —  are 
here  enshrined  in  the  grandest  sepulchre  on  earth. 


Jl'cshninsier  Abbey.  1 1 1 

'Ihe  interments  tint  have  been  effected  in  and 
around  the  Abbey,  since  ihe  remote  age  of  Edward 
the  Confessor,  must  number  thousands ;  but  only 
about  600  are  named  in  the  guide-books.  In  the 
south  transept,  which  is  Poets'  Corner,  rest  Chau- 
cer, Spenser,  Drayton,  Cowley,  Dryden,  IJeaumont, 
Davenant,  Prior,  Gay,  Congreve,  Rowe,  Dr.  John- 
son, Campbell,  Macaulay,  and  Dickens.  Memorials 
to  many  other  poets  and  writers  have  been  ranged 
on  the  adjacent  walls  and  pillars ;  but  these  are 
among  the  authors  that  were  actually  buried  in  this 
place.  Benjonson  is  not  here,  but  —  in  an  upright 
posture,  it  is  said  —  under  the  north  aisle  of  the 
Abbey  ;  Addison  is  in  the  chapel  of  Henry  the  Sev- 
enth, at  the  foot  of  the  monument  of  Charles  Mon- 
tague, the  great  Earl  of  Halifax;  and  Bulwer  is  in 
the  chapel  of  Saint  Edmund.  Garrick,  Sheridan, 
Henderson,  Cumberland,  Handel,  Parr,  Sir  Archi- 
bald Campbell,  and  the  once  so  mighty  Duke  of 
Argyle  are  almost  side  by  side  ;  while,  at  a  little 
distance,  sleep  Anne  of  Cleves,  the  divorced  wife 
of  Henry  the  Eighth,  and  Anne  Neville,  the  mur- 
dered Queen  of  Richard  the  Third.  Betterton  and 
Spranger  Barry  are  in  the  cloisters  —  where  may  be 
read,  in  four  little  words,  the  most  touching  of  all 
the  epitaphs  in  the  Abbey:  "Jane  Lister  —  dear 
child."  There  are  no  monuments  to  either  Byron, 
Shelley,  Swift,  Pope,  Bolingbroke,  Keats,  Cowper, 
Moore,  Young,  or  Coleridge;  but  ^lason  and 
Shadwell  are  commemorated ;   and  Barton   Booth 


112  The  Trip  to  England. 

is  splendidly  inurned;  while  hard  by,  in  the  clois- 
ters,   a   place   was    found   for   Mrs.    Cibber,    Tom 
Brown,  Anne  Bracegirdle,  and  Aphra  Behn.     The 
destinies  have  not  always  been  stringently  fastid- 
ious as  to  the  admission  of  lodgers  to  this  sacred 
ground.     The   pilgrim  is  startled  by  some  of  the 
names  that  he  finds  in  Westminster  Abbey,  ail'd 
pained  by  reflection  on  the  absence  of  some  that 
he  will  seek  in  vain.     Yet  he  will  not  fail  to  moral- 
ize, as  he  strolls  in  Poets'  Corner,  upon  the  inex- 
orable justice  with  which  time  repudiates  fictitious 
reputations,   and    twines    the    laurel   on   only   the 
worthiest  brows.     In  well-nigh  five  hundred  years 
of  English  literature  there  have  lived  only  about 
a  hundred  and  ten  poets  whose  names  survive  in 
any  needed  clironicle  ;  and  not  all  of  these  possess 
life,  outside  of  the  Hbrary.     To  muse  over  the  liter- 
ary memorials  in  the  Abbey  is  also  to  think  upon 
the   seeming   caprice   of    chance    with   which    the 
graves  of  the  British  poets  have  been  scattered  far 
and  wide  throughout  the  land.     Gower,  Fletcher, 
and  Massinger  (to  name  but  a  few  of, them)  rest 
in  Southwark ;  Sydney,  Donne,  and  Butler,  in  St. 
Paul's  ;    More   (his    head,   that    is,  while   his  body 
moulders   in   the    Tower   Chapel),  at    Canterbury, 
Drummond   in    Lasswade  church  ;    Dorset  at  Wi- 
thiam,  in  Sussex;   Waller  at  Beaconsfield ;   Wither 
in  the  church  of  the  Savoy ;  Milton  in  the  church 
of  the  Cripplegate ;  Swift  at  Dublin,  in  St.  Patrick's 
Cathedral ;  Young  at  Welwyn ;  Pope  at  Twicken- 


Wcstiniiistcr  Abbey.  113 

ham ;  Thomson  at  Richmond  ;  Gray  at  Stoke- 
Pogis ;  Watts  in  Bunhill-Fielcis ;  Collins  at  Chi- 
chester; Cowper  in  Dereham  church;  Goldsmith 
in  the  garden  of  the  Temple  ;  Savage  at  Bristol ; 
Burns  at  Dumfries;  Rogers  at  Hornsey;  Crabbe 
at  Trowbridge  ;  Scott  in  Drylnirgh  Abbey  ;  Cole- 
ridge at  Highgate  ;  Byron  in  IlucUnall  church,  near 
Nottingham;  Moore  at  Bromham  ;  Montgomery  at 
Sheffield;  Ileber  at  Calcutta;  Soutliey  in  Cross- 
thwaite  church-yard,  near  Keswick  ;  Wordsworth 
and  Hartley  Coleridge  side  by  side  in  the  church- 
yard of  Grasmere;  and  Clough  at  Florence  —  whose 
lovely  words  may  here  speak  for  all  of  them  : 

"One  port,  methought, 

Alike  tliey  sought, 
One  purpose  held,  where  'or  they  fare : 

O  bounding  breeze, 

O  rushing  seas. 
At  last,  at  last,  unite  them  there !  " 

But  it  is  not  alone  in  the  great  Abbey  that  the 
rambler  in  London  is  impressed  by  poetic  antiquity 
and  touching  historic  association  —  always  presum- 
ing that  lie  has  been  a  reader  of  English  litera- 
ture, and  that  his  reading  has  sunk  into  his  mind. 
Little  things,  equally  with  great  ones,  commingled 
in  a  medley,  luxuriant  and  delicious,  so  people  the 
memory  of  such  a  pilgrim  that  all  his  walks  will  be 
haunted.  The  London  of  to-day,  to  be  sure  (as 
may  be  seen  in  ^Llcaulay's  famous  Third  Chapter, 
and  in  Scott's  "  Fortunes  of  Nigel''),  is  very  little 

8 


114  The  Trip  io  England. 

like  even  the  London  of  Charles  the  Second,  when 
the  great  fire  had   destroyed  eighty-nine  churches 
and  13,000  houses,  and  when  what  is  now  Regent 
street   was  a  rural    soHtude,   in   which    sportsmen 
sometimes  shot  the  woodcock.     Yet,  though  much 
of  the  old  capital  has  vanished,  and  more  of  it  has 
been  changed,  many  remnants  of  its  historic  past 
exist,   and    many   of    its   streets    and    houses   are 
fraught  witli  a  delightful,  romantic  interest.     It  is 
not  forgotten  that  sometimes  the  charm  resides  in 
the  eyes  that  see,  quite  as  much  as  in  the  object 
that  is  seen.     The  stoned  spots  of  London  may 
not  be   appreciable   by   all   who  look    upon  them 
every  day.     The  cab-drivers   in    Kensington   may 
neither  regard,  nor  even  notice,  the  house  in  which 
Thackeray  lived  and  died.    The  shop-keepers  of  old 
Bond  street  may,  perhaps,  neither  care  nor  know  that 
in  this  famous  avenue  was  enacted  the  woful  death- 
scene  of  Laurence  Sterne.     The  Bow-street  runners 
are  quite  unlikely  to  think  of  Will's  Coffee  House, 
andDryden,  or  Button's,  and  Addison,  as  they  pass 
the  sites  of  those  vanished  haunts  of  wit  and  rev- 
elry in  the  days  of  Queen  Anne.     The  fashionable 
lounger  tlirough  Berkeley  square,  when  perchance 
he  pauses  at  the  corner  of  Bruton  street,  will  not 
discern  Colley  Cibber,  in  wig  and  ruffles,  standing 
at  the  parlour  window  and  drumming  with  his  hands 
on  the  frame.     The  casual  passenger,  halting  at  the 
Tavistock,  will  not  remember  that  this  was  once 
Macklin's   Ordinary,  and   so  conjure  up  the  iron 


Wtstininstcr  Abbey.  115 

visage  and  ferocious  aspect  of  the  first  great  Shy- 
lock  of  the  British  stage,  formally  obsequious  to  his 
guests,  or  striving  to  edify  them,  despite  the  banter 
of  the  volatile   Foote,  with  discourse   upon   "the 
Causes   of   Duelling   in   Ireland."     The   Barbican 
does  not  to  every  one  summon  the  austere  memory 
of  Milton  ;  nor  Holborn  raise  tlic  melancholy  shade 
of  Chatterton  ;   nor  Tower  Hill  arouse  the  gloomy 
ghost  of  Otway;    nor    Hampstead    lure    forth    the 
sunny  figure  of  Steele  and  the  passionate  face  of 
Keats  ;  nor  old   Northampton   Street   suggest  the 
burly  presence  of  "  rare  Ben  Jonson  ;  "  nor  opulent 
Kensington  revive  the  stately  head  of  Addison  ;  nor 
a  certain  window  in  Wellington  Street,   reveal,  in 
fancy's  picture,  the  rugged  lineaments  and  splendid 
eyes  of  Dickens.     Yet  London  never  disappoints  ; 
and,  for  him  who  knows  and  feels  its  history,  these 
associations,  and  hundreds  like  to  these,  make  it 
populous  with  noble  or  strange  or  pathetic  figures, 
and  diversify  the  aspect  of  its  vital  present  with 
pictures  of  an  equally  vital  past.     Such  a  wanderer 
discovers  that,  in  this  vast  capital,  there  is  literally 
no  end  to  the  themes  that  are    to    stir  his  imasfi- 
nation,    touch   his    heart,    and    broaden    his   mind. 
Soothed   already  by  the  equable   English   climate 
and  the  lovely  English  scenery,  he  is  aware  now 
of  an  influence  in  the  solid  English  city  that  turns 
his    intellectual    life    to    perfect   tranquillity.     He 
stands  amidst  achievements  that  are  finished,  ca- 
reers that  are  consummated,  irrcat  deeds  that  are 


ii6  The  Trip  to  England. 

done,  great  memories  that  are  immortal :  he  views 
and  comprehends  the  sum  of  all  that  is  possible  to 
human  thought,  passion,  and  labour;  and  then, — 
high  over  mighty  London,  above  the  dome  of  St. 
Paul's  Cathedral,  piercing  the  clouds,  greeting  the 
sun,  drawing:  into  itself  all  the  tremendous  life  of 
the  great  city  and  all  the  meaning  of  its  past  and 
present,  —  the  golden  cross  of  Christ ! 


^=dlit> 


THE    HOME    OF    SHAKESPEARE. 


[Reprinted  from  Harper's  Magazine,  for  May,  1S79.] 


Others  abide  our  question.     Thou  art  free. 
We  ask  ahd  ask :  thou  smilest  and  art  still, 
Out-topping  knoudcdge.     For  the  loftiest  hill 
That  to  the  stars  uncrowns  his  majesty, 
Planting  his  steadfast  footsteps  in  the  sea, 
Making  the  heaven  of  heavens  his  dwelling-place. 
Spares  but  the  cloudy  border  of  his  base 
To  the  foiled  searching  of  mortality. 
Aftd  thou,  who  didst  the  stars  and  sunbeams  know. 
Self-schooled,  self-scanned,  self-honoured,  self-secure, 
Didst  walk  on  carih  itnguessed  at.     Better  sol 
All  pains  the  immortal  spirit  must  endure. 
All  weakness  thai  impairs,  all  griefs  that  bow. 
Find  their  sole  voice  in  that  victorious  brozu. 

—  Matthew  Arnold. 


XIII. 


THE  HOME  OF  SHAKESPEARE. 


TT  is  the  everlasting  glory  of  Stratford-upon-Avon 
-*■  that  it  was  the  birth-place  of  Shakespeare.  In 
itself,  although  a  pretty  and  charming  spot,  it  is  not, 
among  English  towns,  either  pre-eminently  beautiful 
or  exceptionally  impressive.  Situated  in  the  heart 
of  Warwickshire,  which  has  been  called  "the  gar- 
den of  England,"  it  nestles  cosily  in  an  atmosphere 
of  tranquil  loveliness,  and  is  surrounded,  indeed, 
witli  evervthing  that  soft  and  gentle  rural  scenery 
can  afford,  to  soothe  the  mind  and  to  nurture  con- 
tentment. It  stands  upon  a  level  plain,  almost  in 
the  centre  of  the  island,  through  which,  between 
the  low  green  hills  that  roll  away  on  either  side, 
the  Avon  flows  downward  to  ancient  Gloucester 
and  the  Severn.  The  country  in  its  neighbourhood 
is  under  perfect  cultivation,  and  for  many   miles 


I20  The  Trip  to  England.  ' 

around  presents  the  appearance  of  a  superbly  ap- 
pointed park.  Portions  of  the  land  are  devoted 
to  crops  and  pasture  ;  other  portions  are  thickly 
wooded  with  oak,  elm,  willow,  and  chestnut;  the 
meadows  are  intersected  by  hedges  of  the  fra- 
grant hawthorn,  and  the  whole  region  smiles  with 
flowers.  Old  manor-houses,  half  hidden  among  the 
trees,  and  thatched  cottages  embowered  with  roses, 
are  sprinkled  through  the  surrounding  landscape  ; 
and  all  the  roads  which  converge  ujjon  this  point  — 
from  Warwick,  Banbury,  Bidford,  Alcester,  Eves- 
ham, Worcester,  and  many  other  contiguous  towns 
—  wind,  in  sun  and  shadow,  through  a  sod  of  green 
velvet,  swept  by  the  cool,  sweet  winds  of  the  Eng- 
lish summer.  Such  felicities  of  situation  and  such 
accessories  of  beauty,  however,  are  not  unusual  in 
England  ;  and  Stratford,  were  it  not  hallowed  by 
association,  though  it  might  always  hold  a  place 
among  the  pleasant  memories  of  the  traveller,  would 
not  have  become  a  shrine  for  the  homage  of  the 
world.  To  Shakespeare  it  owes  its  renown  ;  from 
Shakespeare  it  derives  the  bulk  of  its  prosperity. 
To  visit  Stratford  is  to  tread  with  affectionate  ven- 
eration in  the  footsteps  of  the  poet.  To  write  about 
Stratford  is  to  write  about  Shakespeare. 

More  than  three  hundred  years  have  passed  since 
the  birth  of  that  colossal  genius,  and  many  changes 
must  have  occurred  in  his  native  town,  within  that 
period.  The  Stratford  of  Shakespeare's  time  was 
built  principally  of  timber  —  as,  indeed,  it  is  now  — 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  121 

and  contained  about  fourteen  hundred  inhabitants. 
To-day  its  population  numbers  upward  of  ten 
thousand.  New  dwelHngs  have  arisen  where  once 
were  fields  of  wheat,  glorious  with  the  siiimmering 
lustre  of  the  scarlet  poppy.  The  older  buildings, 
for  the  most  part,  have  been  demolished  or  altered. 
Manufactories,  chiefly  of  beer  and  of  Shakespearean 
relics,  have  been  stimulated  into  prosperous  activity. 
The  Avon  has  been  spanned  by  a  new  bridge,  of 
iron.  The  village  streets  have  been  levelled,  swept, 
rolled,  and  garnished  till  they  look  like  a  Flemish 
drawins  of  the  Middle  Asjes.  Even  the  Shakes- 
peare  cottage,  the  ancient  Tudor  house  in  High 
street,  and  the  two  old  churches  —  authentic  and 
splendid  memorials  of  a  distant  and  storied  past  — 
have  been  "restored."  If  the  poet  could  walk 
again  through  his  accustomed  haunts,  though  he 
would  see  the  same  smiling  country  round  about, 
and  hear,  as  of  old,  the  ripple  of  the  Avon  murmur- 
ing in  its  summer  sleep,  his  eyes  would  rest  on 
scarce  a  single  object  that  once  he  knew.  Yet, 
there  are  the  paths  that  Shakespeare  often  trod ; 
there  stands  the  house  in  which  he  was  born; 
there  is  the  school  in  which  he  was  taught ;  there 
is  the  cottage  in  which  he  wooed  his  sweetheart, 
and  in  which  he  dwelt  with  her  as  his  wife:  there 
are  the  ruins  and  relics  of  the  mansionin  which  he 
died;  and  there  is  the  church  that  keeps  his  dust. 
so  consecrated  by  the  reverence  of  mankind 
"  That  kinds  for  such  a  tomb  would  wish  to  die." 


122  The  Trip  to  England. 

In  shape  the  town  of  Stratford  somewhat  re- 
sembles a  large  cross,  which  is  formed  by  High 
street,  running  nearly  north  and  south,  and  Bridge 
street,  running  nearly  east  and  west.  From  these, 
which  are  main  avenues,  radiate  many  and  de- 
vious branches.  A  few  of  the  streets  are  broad 
and  straight,  but  many  of  them,  particularly  on  tfie 
water  side,  are  narrow  and  circuitous.  High  and 
Bridge  streets  intersect  each  other  at  the  centre  of 
the  tow^n,  and  here  stands  the  market-house;  an 
ancient  building,  with  belfry-tower  and  illuminated 
clock,  facing  eastward  toward  the  old  stone  bridge, 
with  fourteen  arches,  —  the  bridge  that  Sir  Hugh 
Clopton  built  across  the  Avon  in  the  reign  of  Henry 
the  Seventh.  From  that  central  point  a  few  steps 
will  bring  the  traveller  to  the  birth-place  of  Shakes- 
peare. It  is  a  little,  two-story  cottage  of  timber 
and  plaster,  on  the  north  side  of  Henley  street,  in 
the  western  part  of  the  town.  It  must  have  been, 
in  its  pristine  days,  much  finer  than  most  of  the 
dwellings  in  its  neighbourhood.  The  one-story 
house,  with  attic  windows,  was  the  almost  invaria- 
ble fashion  of  building,  in  all  English  country  towns, 
till  the  seventeenth  century.  This  cottage,  besides 
its  two  stories,  had  dormer-windows  above  its  roof, 
a  pent-house  over  its  door,  and  altogether  was  built 
and  appointed  in  a  manner  both  luxurious  and  sub- 
stantial. Its  age  IS  unknown  ;  but  the  history  of 
Stratford  reaches  back  to  a  period  three  hundred 
years    antecedent   to  William    the  Conqueror,  and 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  1 23 

fancy,  therefore,  is  allowed  the  amplest  room  to 
magnify  its  antiquity.  It  was  bought,  or  at  all 
events  occupied,  by  Shakespeare's  father  in  1555, 
and  in  it  he  resided  till  his  death,  in  1601,  when  it 
descended  by  inheritance  to  the  poet.  Such  is  the 
substance  of  the  somewhat  confused  documentary 
evidence  and  of  the  emphatic  tradition  which  con- 
secrate this  cottage  as  llic  house  in  which  Shake- 
speare was  born.  The  point,  as  is  well  known,  has 
never  been  absolutely  settled  John  Shakespeare, 
the  father,  in  1564,  was  the  owner  not  only  of  the 
house  in  Henley  street,  but  of  another  in  Greenhill 
street,  and  of  still  another  at  Ingon,  about  a  mile 
and  a  half  from  Stratford,  on  the  road  to  Warwick. 
William  Shakespeare  might  have  been  born  at 
either  of  these  dwellings,  and  it  is  not  impossible 
that  several  generations  of  the  i)oet\s  worshippers 
have  been  dilating  with  emotion  in  the  wrong  place. 
Tradition,  however,  has  sanctified  the  Henley- 
street  cottage ;  and  this,  accordingly,  as  Shakes- 
peare's cradle,  will  doubtless  be  piously  guarded 
to  a  late  posterity. 

It  has  already  survived  serious  perils  and  vicissi- 
tudes. By  Shakespeare's  will  it  was  bequeathed 
to  his  sister  Joan — Mrs.  William  Hart— to  be 
held  by  her,  under  the  yearly  rent  of  twelvepence, 
during  her  life,  and  at  her  death  to  revert  to  his 
daughter  Susanna  and  her  descendants.  His  sis- 
ter Joan  appears  to  have  been  living  there  at  the 
time  of  his  decease,  in  1616.     She  is  known  to  have 


124  The  Trip  to  England.  » 

been  living  there  in  1639  —  twenty-three  years  later 
—  and  doubtless  she  resided  there  till  her  death,  in 
1646.     The  estate  then  passed  to  Susanna — Mrs. 
John   Hall  —  from  whom  in   1649  it  descended  to 
her  grandchild,   Lady  Barnard,  who  left  it  to  her 
kinsmen,  Thomas  and  George  Hart,  grandsons  of 
Joan.     In  this  line  of  descent  it  continued — sub- 
ject to  many  of  those  infringements  which  are  inci- 
dental to  poverty  7— till  1806,  when  William  Shake- 
speare Hart,  the  seventh  in  collateral  kinship  from 
the  poet,  sold  it  to  Thomas  Court,  from  whose  fam- 
ily it  was  at  last  purchased  for  the  British  nation. 
Meantime  the  property,  which  originally  consisted 
of  two  tenements  and  a  considerable  tract  of  adja- 
cent land,  had,  little  by  little,  been  curtailed  of  its 
fair  proportions    by  the   sale   of   its   gardens   and 
orchards.     The  two  tenements  —  two  in  one,  that 
is  —  had  been  subdivided.     A  part  of  the  building 
became   an   inn  —  at   first   called    "  The    Maiden- 
head," afterward   "The   Swan,"  and  finally  "The 
Swan  and  Maidenhead."     Another  part  became  a 
butcher's  shop.     The  old  dormer  windows  and  the 
pent-house  disappeared.     A  new  brick  casing  was 
foisted  upon  the  tavern  end  of  the  structure.     In 
front  of  the  butcher's  shop  appeared  a  sign  an- 
nouncing "  William  Shakespeare  was  born  in  this 
house.     N.  B.  —  A  Horse  and  Taxed  Cart  to  Let." 
Still  later  appeared  another  legend,  vouching  that 
"  the    immortal    Shakespeare    was    born    in    this 
house."     From   1793  till   1820  Thomas  and  Mary 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  125 

Hornby,  connections  by  marriage  witli  the  Harts, 
lived  in  tlie  SlKii<e.speare  cottage  —  now  at  length 
become  the  resort  of  literary  pilgrims  —  and  Mary 
Hornby,  who  set  up  to  be  a  poet,  and  wrote  tragedy, 
comedy,  and  philosophy,  took  great  delight  in  ex- 
hibiting its  rooms  to  visitors.  During  the  reign  of 
this  eccentric  custodian  tlie  low  ceilinfrs  and  white- 
washed  walls  of  its  several  chamliers  became  cov- 
ered with  autographs,  scrawled  thereon  by  many 
enthusiasts,  including  some  of  the  most  famous 
persons  in  Europe.  In  1820  Mary  Hornby  was 
requested  to  leave  the  premises.  She  did  not  wish 
to  go.  She  could  not  endure  the  thought  of  a  suc- 
cessor. "  After  me,  the  deluge."  She  was  obliged 
to  abdicate;  but  she  conveyed  away  all  the  furni- 
ture and  relics  alleged  to  be  connected  with  Shake- 
speare's family,  and  she  hastily  whitewashed  the  cot- 
tage walls.  Only  a  small  part  of  the  wall  of  the 
upper  room,  the  chamber  in  which  "nature's  dar- 
ling" first  saw  the  light,  escaped  this  act  of  spiteful 
sacrilege.  On  the  space  beliind  its  door  may  still 
be  read  many  names,  with  dates  affi.xed,  ranging 
back  from  1820  to  1792.  Among  them  is  that  of 
Dora  Jordan,  the  beautiful  and  fascinating  actress, 
who  wrote  it  there  June  2,  1S09.  Much  of  Mary 
Hornby's  wliitewash,  which  chanced  to  be  unsized, 
was  afterward  removed,  so  that  her  work  of  obliter- 
ation proved  only  in  part  successful.  Other  names 
have  been  added  to  this  singular,  chaotic  scroll  of 
worship.     Byron,  Scott,  Thackera\-,  Kean,  Tenny- 


126  The  Trip  to  England. 

son,  and  Dickens  are  illustrious  among  the  votaries 
here  and  thus  recorded.  The  successors  of  Mary 
Hornby  guarded  their  charge  with  pious  care.  The 
precious  value  of  the  old  Shakespeare  cottage  grew 
more  and  more  sensible  to  the  English  people. 
Washington  Irving  made  his  famous  pilgrimage  to 
Stratford,  and  recounted  it  in  his  beautiful  "  Sketch- 
Book."  Yet  it  was  not  till  Mr.  Barnum,  from  the 
United  States,  arrived  with  a  proposition  to  buy 
the  Shakespeare  house  and  convey  it  to  America 
that  the  literary  enthusiasm  of  Great  Britain  was 
made  to  take  a  practical  shape ;  and  this  venerated 
and  inestimable  relic  became,  in  1847,  a  national 
possession.  In  1856,  John  Shakespeare,  of  Wor- 
thington  field,  near  Ashby-de-la-Zouch,  gave  ;^2,5oo 
to  preserve  and  restore  it;  and  within  the  next  two 
years,  under  the  superintendence  of  Edward  Gibbs, 
an  architect  of  Stratford,  it  was  isolated  by  the 
demolition  of  the  cottages  at  its  sides  and  in  the 
rear,  repaired  wherever  decay  was  visible,  set  in 
perfect  order,  and  restored  to  its  ancient  self. 

The  builders  of  this  house  must  have  done  their 
work  thoroughly  well,  for,  even  after  all  these  years 
of  rough  usage  and  of  slow  but  incessant  decline, 
the  great  timbers  remain  solid,  the  plastered  walls 
are  firm,  the  huge  chimney-stack  is  as  permanent 
as  a  rock,  and  the  ancient  flooring  only  betrays  by 
the  scooped-out  aspect  of  its  boards,  and  the  high 
polish  on  the  heads  of  the  nails  which  fasten  them 
down,  that  it  belongs  to  a  period  of  rem.ote  antiq- 


Tlte  Home  of  Shakespeare.  127 

iiity.     TI1C  cottage  stands  close  upon  the  margin  of 
the  street,  according  to  ancient  custom  of  i)uilding 
throughout  Stratford  ;  and,  entering  through  a  Httle 
porch,  the  pilgrim  stands  at  once  in  that  low-ceiled, 
flag-stoned  room,  with  its  wide  fire-place,  so  familiar 
in  prints  of  tlie  chimney-corner  of  Shakespeare's 
youthful  days.     Witliin  the  fire-place,  on  either  side, 
are  seats  fashioned  in  the  brick-work  ;  and  here,  as 
it  is  pleasant  to  imagine,  the  boy-poet  often  sat,  on 
winter  nights,  gazing  dreamily  into  the  flames,  and 
building  castles  in  that  fairy-land  of  fancy  which  was 
his  celestial  inheritance.     Nothing  else  in  this  room 
detains  attention,  and  you  presently  pass  from  it  by 
a  narrow,  well-worn  staircase  to  the  chamber  above, 
which   is  shown  as  the  place  of  the  poet's  birth. 
An  antiquated  chair,  of  the  si.xteenth  century,  stands 
in  the  right-hand  corner.     At   the  left  is  a  small 
fire-place,  made  in  tlie  rectangular  form  which  is 
still  usual.     All  around   the  walls  are  visible  the 
great  beams  which  are  the  frame-work  of  the  build- 
ing—  beams  of  seasoned  oak  that  will  last  forever. 
Opposite   to  the  door  of   entrance  is  a  three-fold 
casement  (the  original  window)  full  of  narrow  panes 
of  white  glass  scrawled  all  over  with   names  that 
their  worshipful  owners  have  written  with  diamonds. 
The  ceiling  is  so  low  that  you  can  easily  touch  it 
with  uplifted  hand.     A  portion  of  it,  about  a  yard 
square,  is  held  in   place  by  an   intricate  net-work 
of  little  laths.     This  room,  and,  indeed,  the  whole 
structure,  is  as  polished  and  lustrous  as  any  waxen, 


128  The  Trip  to  England. 

royal  liall  in  the  Louvre;  and  it  impresses  observa- 
tion very  much  hke  old  lace  that  has  been  treasured 
up  in  lavender  or  jasmine.  These  walls,  which  no 
one  is  now  permitted  to  mar,  were  naturally  the 
favourite  scroll  of  the  Shakespeare  votaries  of  long 
ago.  Every  inch  of  the  plaster  bears  marks  of  the 
pencil  of  reverence.  Hundreds  of  names  are  wfit- 
len  here  —  some  of  them  famous,  but  most  of  them 
obscure,  and  all  destined  at  no  very  distant  day  to 
perish  where  they  stand.  On  the  chimney-piece 
at  the  riglit  of  the  fire-place,  which  is  named  the 
"Actors'  Pillar,"  many  actors  have  inscribed  their 
signatures.  Edmund  Kean  wrote  his  name  here  — 
probably  the  greatest  Shakespearean  actor  that  ever 
lived  —  and  with  what  soulful  veneration  and  spir- 
itual sympathy  it  is  awful  even  to  try  to  imagine. 
Sir  Walter  Scott's  name  is  scratched  with  a  dia- 
mond on  the  window  —  "  W.  Scott."  That  of 
Thackeray  appears  on  the  ceiling,  and  close  by  it 
is  that  of  Helen  Faucit.  Vestris  is  written  near 
the  fire-place.  Mark  Lemon  and  Charles  Dickens 
are  together  on  the  opposite  wall.  The  catalogue 
would  be  endless  ;  and  it  is  not  of  these  offerings  of 
fealty  that  you  think  when  you  sit  and  muse  alone 
in  that  mysterious  chamber.  As  once  again  I  con- 
jure up  that  strange  and  solemn  scene,  the  sun- 
shine rests  in  checkered  squares  upon  the  ancient 
floor,  the  motes  swim  in  the  sunbeams,  the  air  is 
very  cold,  the  place  is  hushed  as  death,  and  over  it 
all  there  broods  an  atmosphere  of  grave  suspense 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  129 

and  hopeless  desolalion  —  a  sense  of  some  tremen- 
dous energy  stricken  dumb  and  frozen  into  silence, 
and  past  and  gone  forever. 

Tlie  other  rooms  which  are  shown  in  the  Shakes- 
peare cottnge  possess  but  few  points  of  special  in- 
terest. Opposite  to  the  birdi-cliambcr,  at  the  rear, 
there  is  a  small  apartment,  in  which  is  displayed 
"the  Stratford  Portrait"  of  the  poet.  Tiiis  painting 
is  supposed  to  have  been  owned  by  the  Clopton 
family,  and  to  have  fallen  into  the  hands  of  William 
Hunt,  an  old  resident  of  Stratford,  who  bought 
their  mansion  of  tlie  Cloptons,  in  1758.  The  ad- 
ventures through  which  it  passed  can  only  be  con- 
jectured. It  does  not  appear  to  have  been  valued, 
and  although  it  remained  in  the  house,  it  was  cast 
away  amongst  lumber  and  rubbish.  In  process 
of  time  it  was  painted  over  and  changed  into  a  dif- 
ferent subject.  Then  it  fell  a  prey  to  dirt  and  damp. 
There  is  a  story  that  the  litUe  boys  of  the  tribe  of 
Hunt  were  accustomed  to  use  it  as  a  target  for  their 
arrows.  At  last,  after  the  lapse  of  a  century,  the 
grandson  of  William  Hunt  showed  it  by  chance  to 
an  expert  artist,  who  luckily  surmised  that  a  valua- 
ble portrait  might  perhaps  e.xist  beneath  its  muddy 
surface.  It  was  carefully  cleaned.  A  thick  beard 
and  a  pair  of  mustaches  were  removed,  and  the  face 
of  Shakespeare  emerged  upon  the  canvas.  It  is 
not  pretended  that  this  portrait  was  painted  in 
Shakespeare's  time.  The  very  close  resemblance 
which  it  bears,  in  attitude,  dress,  colours,  and  other 

9 


130  The  Trip  to  England. 

peculiarities,  to  the  painted  bust  of  the  poet  in 
Stratford  church  seems  clearly  to  indicate  that  it 
was  a  modern  copy  of  that  work.  Upon  a  brass 
plate  affixed  to  it  is  the  following  inscription  :  "  This 
portrait  of  Shakespeare,  after  being  in  the  posses- 
sion of  Mr.  William  Oakes  Hunt,  town-clerk  of 
Stratford,  and  his  family,  for  upward  of  a  centuf-y, 
was  restored  to  its  original  condition  by  Mr.  Simon 
Collins  of  London,  and,  being  considered  a  portrait 
of  much  interest  and  value,  was  given  by  Mr.  Hunt 
to  the  town  of  Stratford-upon-Avon,  to  be  preserved 
in  Shakespeare's  house,  23d  April,  1862."  There, 
accordingly,  it  remains,  and  in  memory's  association 
with  the  several  other  dubious  presentments  of  the 
poet,  cheerfully  adds  to  the  mental  confusion  of  tlie 
pilgrim  who  would  fain  form  an  accurate  ideal  of 
Shakespeare's  appearance.  Standing  in  its  pres- 
ence, it  was  worth  while  to  reflect  that  there  are 
only  two  authentic  representations  of  Shakespeare 
in  existence  —  the  Droeshout  portrait  and  the  Ge- 
rard Johnson  bust.  They  may  not  be  perfect  works 
of  art ;  they  may  not  do  perfect  justice  to  the  origi- 
nal ;  but  they  were  seen  and  accepted  by  persons 
to  whom  Shakespeare  had  been  a  living  companion. 
The  bust  was  sanctioned  by  his  children ;  the  por- 
trait—  fourteen  times  copied  and  engraved  within 
fifty  years  after  his  death  —  was  sanctioned  by  his 
friend  Ben  Jonson,  and  by  his  brother  actors  Hem- 
inge  and  Condell,  who  prefixed  it,  in  1623,  to  the 
first  folio  of  his  works.     Standing  amongst  the  relics 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  131 

which  have  been  gathered    into  a  museum  in  an 
apartment  on  the  ground-floor  of  the  cottnge,  it  was 
essential  also  to  remember  how  often  "  tiie  wish  is 
father  to  the  thought"  that  sanctifies  the  uncertain 
memorials  of  the  distant  past.     Several  of  the  most 
suggestive  documents,  tliough,  which  bear  upon  the 
vague  and  shadowy  record  of  Sliakespeare's  life  are 
preserved  in  this  place.     Here  is  a  deed,  made  in 
1596,  which  proves  that  this  house  was  his  father's 
residence.     Here  is  the  only  letter  addressed   to 
him  which  is  known  to  exist  —  the  letter  of  Richard 
Quiney  (159S)  asking  for  the  loan  of  thirty  pounds. 
Here  is  his  declaration  in  a  suit,  in  1604,  to  recover 
the  price  of  some  malt  that  he  had  sold  to  Philip 
Rogers.     Here  is  a  deed,  dated   1609,  on  which  is 
the  autograph  of  his  brother  Gilbert,  who  repre- 
sented him  at  Stratford  in  his  business  affairs  while 
he  was  absent  in  London,  and  who,  surviving,  it  is 
dubiously  said,  almost  till  the  period  of  the  Res- 
toration, talked,  as  a  very  old  man,  of  the  poet's 
impersonation  of  Adam  in  "  As  You  Like  It."     Here 
likewise  is  shown  a  gold  seal  ring,  found  not  many 
years  ago  in  a  field  near  Stratford  church,  on  which, 
delicately  engraved,  appear  the  letters  W.   S.,  en- 
twined with  a  true-lover's  knot.     It  may  have  be- 
longed to  Shakespeare.     The  conjecture  is  that  it 
did,  and  that,  since  on  the  last  of  the  three  sheets 
which  contain  his  will  the  word  "seal"  is  stricken 
out  and  the  word  "hand"  substituted,  he  did  not 
seal  this  document  because  he  had  only  just  then 


132  The  Trip  to  England. 

lost  this  ring.  The  supposition  is,  at  least,  inge- 
nious. It  will  not  harm  the  visitor  to  accept  it. 
Nor,  as  he  stands  poring  over  the  ancient  and  de- 
crepit school-desk  which  has  been  lodged  in  this  mu- 
seum, from  the  grammar  school  in  High  street,  will  it 
greatly  tax  his  credulity  to  believe  that  the  "  shining 
morning  face  "  of  the  boy  Shakespeare  once  looked 
down  upon  it  in  the  irksome  quest  of  his  "  small 
Latin  and  less  Greek."  They  call  it  "  Shake- 
speare's desk."  It  is  very  old,  and  it  is  certainly 
known  to  have  been  in  the  school  of  the  Chapel  of 
the  Holy  Guild,  three  hundred  years  ago.  There 
are  other  relics,  more  or  less  indirectly  connected 
with  the  great  name  that  is  here  commemorated. 
The  inspection  of  them  all  would  consume  many 
days  ;  the  description  of  them  would  occupy  many 
pages.  You  write  your  name  in  the  visitors'  book 
at  parting,  and  perhaps  stroll  forth  into  the  garden 
of  the  cottage,  which  incloses  it  at  the  sides  and  in 
the  rear,  and  there,  beneath  the  leafy  boughs  of  the 
English  elm,  while  your  footsteps  press  "  the  grassy 
carpet  of  this  jjlain,"  behold  growing  all  around 
you  the  rosemary,  pansies,  fennel,  columbines,  rue, 
daisies,  and  violets,  which  make  the  imperishable 
garland  on  Ophelia's  grave,  and  which  are  the  fra- 
grance of  her  solemn  and  lovely  memory. 

Thousands  of  times  the  wonder  must  have  been 
expressed  that,  while  the  world  knows  so  much 
about  Shakespeare's  mind,  it  should  know  so  little 
about  his  history.     The  date  of  his  birth,  even,^  is 


I'hc  Home  of  Shakespeare.  133 

established  by  an  inference.  The  register  of  Strat- 
ford church  shows  that  he  was  baptized  there  in 
1564,  on  the  26th  of  April.  It  is  said  to  hnve  been 
customary  to  baptize  infants  on  tlie  third  day  after 
their  birth.  It  is  presumed  that  the  custom  was 
followed  in  tliis  instance,  and  hence  it  is  deduced 
that  Shakespeare  was  born  on  April  23d  —  a  date 
which,  making  allowance  for  the  difference  between 
the  old  and  new  styles  of  reckoning  time,  corre- 
sponds to  our  3d  of  May.  Equally  by  an  inference 
it  is  established  that  the  boy  was  educated  in  the 
free  grammar  school.  The  school  was  there ;  and 
any  boy  of  the  town,  who  was  seven  years  old  and 
able  to  read,  could  get  admission  to  it.  Shakes- 
peare's father,  chief  alderman  of  Stratford,  and  then 
a  man  of  worldly  substance,  though  afterward  he 
became  poor,  would  surely  have  wislied  that  his 
children  should  grow  up  in  knowledge.  To  the 
ancient  school-house,  accordingly,  and  the  adjacent 
chapel  of  the  guild  —  which  are  still  extant,  on  the 
southeast  corner  of  Chapel  and  High  streets  —  the 
pilgrim  confidently  traces  the  footsteps  of  the  poet. 
These  buildings  are  of  singular  beauty  and  qu.iint- 
ness.  The  chapel  dates  back  to  about  the  middle 
of  the  thirteenth  century.  It  was  a  Roman  Catho- 
lic institution,  founded  in  1269,  under  the  patronage 
of  the  Bishop  of  Worcester,  and  committed  to  the 
pious  custody  of  the  guild  of  Stratford.  A  hospital 
was  connected  with  it  in  those  days,  and  Robert  de 
Stratford  was  its  first  master.     New  privileges  and 


134  The  Trip  to  England. 

confirmation  were  granted  to  the  guild  by  Henry  the 
Fourth,  in  1403  and  1429.  The  grammar  school,  es- 
tablished on  an  endowment  of  lands  and  tenements 
by  Thomas  Jolyffe,  was  set  up  in  association  with 
it  in  1482.  Toward  the  end  of  the  reign  of  Henry 
the  Seventh,  the  whole  of  the  chapel,  excepting  the 
chancel,  was  torn  down  and  rebuilt  under  the  munifi- 
cent direction  of  Sir  Hugli  Clopton,  Lord  Mayor  of 
London,  and  Stratford's  chief  citizen  and  benefactor. 
Under  Llenry  the  Eighth,  when  came  the  stormy 
times  of  the  Reformation,  the  priests  were  driven  out, 
the  guild  was  dissolved,  and  the  chapel  was  despoiled. 
Edward  the  Sixth,  however,  granted  a  new  charter 
to  this  ancient  institution,  and  with  especial  precau- 
tions reinstated  the  school.  The  chapel  itself  was 
used  as  a  school-room  when  Shakespeare  was  a 
boy,  and  till  as  late  as  the  year  1595  ;  and  in  case 
the  lad  did  really  go  thither  (in  1571)  as  a  pupil, 
he  must  have  been  from  childhood  familiar  with 
what  is  still  visible  upon  its  walls  —  the  very  re- 
markable series  of  grotesque  paintings  which  there 
present,  as  in  a  pictorial  panorama,  the  history  of 
the  Holy  Cross,  from  its  origin  as  a  tree  at  the 
beginning  of  the  world,  to  its  exaltation  at  Jerusa- 
lem. These  paintings  were  brought  to  light  in  1804 
in  the  course  of  a  general  repairing  of  the  chapel, 
which  then  occurred,  when  tlie  walls  were  relieved 
of  thick  coatings  of  whitewash,  laid  on  them  long  be- 
fore, in  Puritan  times,  either  to  spoil  or  to  hide  from 
the  spoiler.     This  chapel  and  its  contents,  in  any 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  135 

case,  constitute  one  of  the  few  remaining  spectacles 
at  Stratford  tliat  bring  us  face  to  face  witli  Shake- 
speare. During  the  last  three  years  of  his  life  he 
dwelt  almost  continually  in  his  house  of  New  Place, 
on  the  corner  immediately  opposite  to  this  church. 
The  configuration  of  tiie  excavated  foundations  of 
that  house  indicates  what  would  now  be  called  a 
deep  bay-window  in  its  southern  front.  There, 
undoubtedly,  was  Shakespeare's  study;  and  through 
that  casement,  many  and  many  a  time,  in  storm  and 
in  sunshine,  by  night  and  by  day,  he  must  have 
looked  out  upon  the  grim,  square  tower,  the  embat- 
tled stone  wall,  and  the  four  tall  Gothic  windows  of 
that  dark,  mysterious  temple.  The  moment  your 
gaze  falls  upon  it,  the  low-breathed,  horror-stricken 
words  of  Lady  Macbeth  spring  involuntarily  to  your 

lips :  — 

"  The  raven  himself  is  lioarse 
That  croaks  the  fatal  entrance  of  Duncan 
Under  my  battlements." 

New  Place,  Shakespeare's  home  at  the  time  of 
his  death,  and  presumably  the  house  in  which  he 
died,  stood  on  the  northeast  corner  of  High  Street 
and  Chapel  Street.  Nothing  now  remains  of  it  but 
a  portion  of  its  foundations  —  long  buried  in  the 
earth,  but  found  and  exhumed  in  comparatively 
recent  days.  Its  gardens  have  been  redeemed, 
through  the  zealous  and  devoted  exertions  of  Mr. 
Halliwcll,  and  have  been  restored  to  what  is 
thought  to  have  been  almost  their  exact  condition 


136  The  Trip  to  England.  - 

when  Shakespeare  owned  them.  The  crumbling 
fragments  of  the  foundation  are  covered  with 
frames  of  wood  and  glass.  A  mulberry-tree  —  the 
grandson  of  the  famous  mulberry  which  Shake- 
speare himself  is  known  to  have  planted  —  is  grow- 
ing on  the  spot  once  occupied  by  its  renowned 
ancestor.  There  is  no  drawing  or  print  in  exist- 
ence which  shows  New  Place  as  it  was  when 
Shakespeare  left  it,  but  tliere  is  a  sketch  of  it  as 
it  appeared  in  1740.  The  house  was  made  of 
brick  and-  timber,  and  was  built  by  Sir  Hugh 
Clopton  nearly  a  century  before  it  became  by 
purchase  the  property  of  the  poet.  Shakespeare 
bouglit  it  in  1597,  and  in  it  passed,  intermittently, 
a  considerable  part  of  the  last  nineteen  years  of  his 
life.  It  had  borne  the  name  of  New  Place  before 
it  came  into  his  possession.  The  Clopton  family 
parted  with  it  in  1563,  and  it  was  subsequently 
owned  by  the  families  of  Bott  and  of  Underbill.  At 
Shakespeare's  death  it  was  inherited  by  his  eldest 
daughter,  Susanna,  wife  to  Dr.  John  Hall.  In 
1643,  Mrs.  Hall,  then  seven  years  a  widow,  being 
still  its  owner  and  occupant,  Henrietta  Maria, 
queen  to  Charles  the  First,  who  had  come  to  Strat- 
ford with  a  part  of  the  royal  army,  resided  for  three 
weeks  at  New  Place,  which,  therefore,  must  even 
then  have  been  the  most  considerable  private  resi- 
dence in  the  town.  Mrs.  Hall  dying  in  1649,  aged 
sixty-six,  left  it  to  her  only  child,  Elizabeth,  then 
Mrs.  Thomas  Nashe,  who  afterward  became  Lady 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  137 

Rarninl,  wife  to  Sir  Thomas  Barnirci,  and  in  whom 
the  direct  line  of  SIi:ike.spcarc  ended.  After  her 
death  the  estate  was  purchased  by  Sir  Edward 
Walker,  in  1675.  wlio  ultimately  left  it  to  his 
dauj^htcr's  husband,  Sir  John  Clopton,  and  so  it 
once  more  passed  into  the  hands  of  the  family  of 
its  founder.  A  second  Sir  Hugh  Clopton  owned  it 
at  the  middle  of  the  last  century,  and  under  his 
direction  it  was  repaired,  freshly  decorated,  and 
furnished  with  a  new  front.  That  proved  the  be- 
ginning of  the  end  of  this  old  structure,  as  a  relic 
of  Shakespeare;  for  this  owner,  dying  in  175 1. 
bequeathed  it  to  his  son-in-law,  Henry  Talbot,  who 
in  1753  sold  it  to  the  most  universally  execrated 
iconoclast  of  modern  times,  the  Rev.  Francis  Gas- 
trell,  vicar  of  Frodsham,  in  Cheshire,  by  whom  it 
was  destroyed.  Mr.  Gastrell,  it  appears,  was  a 
man  of  large  fortune  and  of  equal  insensibility.  He 
knew  little  of  Shakespeare,  but  he  knew  that  the 
frequent  incursion,  into  his  garden,  of  strangers  who 
came  to  sit  beneath  '•  Shakespeare's  mulberry ''  was 
a  troublesome  annoyance.  He  struck,  therefore,  at 
the  root  of  the  ve.\ation,  and  cut  down  the  tree. 
This  was  in  1756.  The  wood  w-as  purchased  by 
Thomas  Sharp,  a  watchmaker  of  Stratford,  who 
subsequently  made  the  solemn  declaration  that  he 
carried  it  to  his  home  and  converted  it  into  toys 
and  kindred  memorial  relics.  The  villagers  of 
Stratford,  meantime,  incensed  at  the  barbarity  of 
I\Ir.  Gastrell,  took  their  revenge   by  breaking  his 


138  The  Trip  to  Efigland.  ' 

windows.  In  this  and  in  other  ways  the  clergyman 
was  probably  made  to  reahze  his  local  unpopularity. 
It  had  been  his  custom  to  reside  during  a  part  of 
each  year  in  Lichfield,  leaving  some  of  his  servants 
in  charge  of  New  Place.  Tlie  overseers  of  Strat- 
ford, having  lawful  authority  to  levy  a  tax,  for  the 
maintenance  of  the  poor,  on  every  house  in  the' 
town  valued  at  more  than  forty  shillings  a  year, 
did  not,  it  may  be  presumed,  neglect  to  make  a 
vigourous  use  of  their  privilege,  in  the  case  of  Mr. 
Gastrell.  The  result  of  their  exactions  in  the 
sacred  cause  of  charity  was  at  least  significant. 
In  1757  Mr.  Gastrell  declared  that  that  house 
should  never  be  taxed  again,  pulled  down  the 
building,  sold  the  materials  of  which  it  had  con- 
sisted, and  left  Stratford  forever.  A  modern  house 
now  stands  on  a  part  of  the  site  of  what  was  once 
Shakespeare's  home,  and  here  has  been  e.stab- 
lished  another  museum  of  Shakespearean  relics. 
None  of  these  relics  is  of  imposing  authenticity 
or  of  remarkable  interest.  Among  them  is  a  stone 
muUion,  dug  up  on  the  site,  which  niust  have  be- 
longed to  a  window  of  the  original  mansion.  This 
entire  estate,  bought  from  different  owners,  and 
restored  to  its  Shakespearean  condition,  became 
in  1875  the  property  of  the  corporation  of  Stratford. 
The  tract  of  land  is  not  large.  The  visitor  may 
traverse  tlie  whole  of  it  in  a  few  minutes,  although 
if  he  obey  his  inclination  he  will  linger  there  for 
hours.     The  inclosure  is  about  three  hundred  feet 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  139 

square,  possibly  larger.     The  lawn  is  in  beautiful 
condition.     The  line  of  the  walls  that  once  sepa- 
rated this  from  the  two  gardens  of  vegetables  and 
of  flowers  is  traced  in  the  turf.     The  mulberry  is 
large  and  flourishing,  and  wears  its  honours  in  con- 
tented vigour.     Other  trees  give  grateful  shade  to 
the  grounds,  and  the  voluptuous  red  roses,  growing 
all   around    in   profuse   richness,  load  the  air  with 
bewildering  fragrance.     Eastward,  at  a  little  dis- 
tance, flows   the   Avon.     Not   far  away  rises   the 
graceful  spire  of  the  Holy  Trinity.     A  few  rooks, 
hovering  in  the  air,  and  wisely  bent  on  some  face- 
tious mischief,  send  down  through  the  silvery  haze 
of  the  summer  morning  their  sagacious  yet  melan- 
choly caw.     The  windows  of  the  gray  chapel  across 
the  street  twinkle,  and  keep   their  solemn  secret. 
On  this  spot  was  first  waved  the  mystic  wand  of 
Prospero.     Here  Ariel  sang  of  dead  mens  bones 
turned  into  pearl  and  coral  in  the  deep  caverns 
of  the  sea.     Here  arose  into  everlasting  life  Her- 
mione,  "as  tender  as  infancy  and  grace."     Here 
were  created  Miranda  and  Perdita,  twins  of  heaven's 

own  radiant  goodness  — 

"  Daffodils 
That  come  before  the  swallow  dares,  and  take 
The  winds  of  March  with  beauty  ;  violets  dim, 
But  sweeter  than  the  lids  of  Juno's  eyes 
Or  Cytherea's  breatli." 

To  endeavour  to  touch  upon  the  larger  and  more 
august  aspect  of  Shakespeare's  life  —  when,  as  his 


140  The  Trip  to  England. 

wonderful  sonnets  betray,  his  great  heart  had  felt 
the  devastating  blast  of  cruel  passions,  and  the 
deepest  knowledge  of  the  good  and  evil  of  the  uni- 
verse had  been  borne  in  upon  his  soul  —  would  be 
impious  presumption.  Happily,  to  the  stroller  in 
Stratford  every  association  connected  with  him  is 
gentle  and  tender.  His  image,  as  it  rises  there,  is' 
of  smiling  boyhood,  or  sedate  and  benignant  matu- 
rity; always  either  joyous  or  serene,  never  passion- 
ate, or  turbulent,  or  dark.  The  pilgrim  thinks  of 
him  as  a  happy  child  at  his  father's  fireside  ;  as  a 
wondering  school-boy  in  the  quiet,  venerable  close 
of  the  old  Guild  Chapel,  where  still  the  only  sound 
that  breaks  the  silence  is  the  chirp  of  birds  or  the 
creaking  of  the  church  vane  ;  as  a  handsome,  daunt- 
less }'Outh,  sporting  by  his  beloved  river  or  roam- 
ing through  field  and  forest  many  miles  about;  as 
the  bold,  adventurous  spirit,  bent  on  frolic  and 
mischief,  and  not  averse  to  danger,  leading,  per- 
haps, the  wild  lads  of  his  village  in  their  poaching 
depredations  on  the  park  of  Charlecote  ;  as  the 
lover,  strolling  through  the  green  lanes  of  Shottery, 
hand  in  hand  with  the  darling  of  his  first  love, 
while  round  them  the  honeysuckle  breathed  out  its 
fragrant  heart  upon  the  winds  of  night,  and  over- 
head the  moonlight,  streaming  through  rifts  of  elm 
and  poplar,  fell  on  their  pathway  in  showers  of 
shimmering  silver;  and,  last  of  all,  as  the  illus- 
trious poet,  rooted  and  secure  in  his  massive  and 
shining  fame,  loved  by  man}-,  and  venerated  and 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  141 

mourned  by  all,  borne  slowly  tiirough  Stratford 
church-yard,  while  the  golden  bells  were  tolled  in 
sorrow,  and  the  mourning  lime-trees  dropped  their 
blossoms  on  his  bier,  to  the  place  of  his  eternal 
rest.  Through  all  the  scenes  incidental  to  this 
experience  the  worshipper  of  Shakespeare's  genius 
may  follow  him  every  step  of  the  way.  The  old 
foot-path  across  the  fields  to  Shottery  remains 
unchanged.  The  wild  flowers  are  blooming  along 
its  margin.  The  white  blossoms  of  the  chestnut 
hang  over  it.  The  green  meadows  through  which 
it  winds  are  thickly  sprinkled  with  the  gorgeous 
scarlet  of  the  poppy.  The  hamlet  of  Shottery  is 
less  than  a  mile  from  Stratford,  stepping  westward 
toward  the  sunset ;  and  there,  nestled  beneath  the 
elms  and  almost  embowered  in  vines  and  roses, 
stands  the  cottajre  in  which  Anne  Hathawav  was 
wooed  and  won.  It  is  even  more  antiquated  in 
appearance  than  the  cottage  of  Shakespeare,  and 
more  obviously  a  relic  of  the  distant  past.  It  is 
built  of  wood  and  plaster,  ribbed  with  massive  tim- 
bers,— ^  crossed  and  visible  all  along  its  front, —  and 
covered  with  a  thatch  roof.  It  fronts  eastward, 
presenting  its  southern  end  to  the  road.  Under 
its  eaves,-  peeping  through  embrasures  cut  in  the 
thatch,  are  four  tiny  casements,  round  which  tlic 
ivy  twines,  and  the  roses  wave  softly  in  the  wind 
of  June.  The  northern  end  of  the  structure  is 
higher  than  the  southern,  and  the  old  building, 
originally  divided  into  two  tenements,  is  now  di- 


142  The  Trip  to  England. 

vided  into  three.  In  front  of  it  is  a  straggling 
terrace  and  a  large  garden.  There  is  a  comforta- 
ble air  of  wildness,  yet  not  of  neglect,  in  all  its 
appointments  and  surroundings.  The  place  is  still 
the  abode  of  labour  and  lowliness.  Entering  its 
parlour  3-ou  see  a  stone  floor,  a  wide  fire-place,  a 
broad,  hospitable  hearth,  with  cosey  chimney-cori 
ners,  and  near  this  an  old  wooden  settle,  much 
decayed  but  still  serviceable,  on  which  Shake- 
speare may  often  have  sat,  with  Anne  at  his  side. 
The  plastered  walls  of  this  room  here  and  there 
reveal  traces  of  an  oaken  wainscot.  The  ceiling  is 
low.  This  evidently  was  the  farm-house  of  a  sub- 
stantial yeoman  in  the  days  of  fJenry  the  Eighth. 
The  Hathaways  had  lived  in  Shottery  for  forty 
years  prior  to  Shakespeare's  marriage.  The  poet, 
then  wholly  undistinguished,  had  just  turned  eigh- 
teen, while  his  bride  was  nearly  twenty-six,  and  it 
is  often  said  now  that  she  acted  ill  in  weddins: 
this  boy-lover.  They  were  married  in  November, 
1582,  and  their  first  child,  Susanna,  came  in  the 
following  May.  Anne  Hathaway  must  have  been 
a  wonderfully  fascinating  woman,  or  Shakespeare 
would  not  so  have  loved  her  ;  and  she  must  have 
loved  him  dearly  —  as  what  woman,  indeed,  could 
help  it?  —  or  she  would  not  thus  have  yielded 
to  his  passion.  There  is  direct  testimony  to  the 
beauty  of  his  person  ;  and  in  the  hght  afforded  by 
his  WTitings  it  requires  no  extraordinary  penetra- 
tion to  conjecture  that  his  brilliant  mind,  sparkling 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  143 

humour,  tender  fancy,  and  impetuous  spirit  must 
have  made  him,  in  his  youth,  tiie  very  paragon  of 
enchanters.  It  is  not  known  wliere  they  hved 
during  the  first  years  after  their  marriage.  Per- 
haps in  this  cottage  at  Shottery.  Perhaps  with 
Hamnet  and  Judith  Sadler,  for  whom  their  twins, 
born  in  1585,  were  named  Hamnet  and  Judith. 
Her  father's  house  assuredly  would  have  been 
chosen  for  Anne's  refuge,  when  presently,  in  1586, 
Shakespeare  was  obliged  to  leave  his  wife  and 
children,  and  go  away  to  London  to  seek  his  for- 
tune. He  did  not  buy  New  Place  till  1597,  but  it 
is  known  tliat  in  the  meantime  he  came  to  his 
native  country  once  every  year.  It  was  I'n  Strat- 
ford that  his  son  Hamnet  died,  in  1596.  Anne  and 
her  children  probably  had  never  left  the  town. 
They  show  her  bedstead  and  other  bits  of  her 
furniture,  together  with  certain  homespun  sheets 
of  everlasting  linen,  that  are  kept  as  heirlooms  to 
this  day,  in  the  garret  of  the  Shottery  cottage. 
Here  is  the  room  that  must  often  have  welcomed 
the  poet  when  he  came  home  from  his  labours  in 
the  great  city.  It  is  a  very  homely  and  humble 
place,  but  the  sight  of  it  makes  the  heart  thrill  with 
a  strange  and  incommunicable  awe.  You  cannot 
wish  to  speak  when  you  are  standing  there.  You 
are  scarcely  conscious  of  the  low  rustling  of  the 
leaves  outside,  the  far-off  sleepy  murmuring  of 
the  brook,  or  the  faint  fragrance  of  woodbine  and 
maiden's-blush  that  is  wafted  in  at  the  open  case- 


144  1"^^^  '^'''P  ^^  England. 

ment,  and  that  swathes  in  nature's  incense  a  mem- 
ory sweeter  than  itself. 

Associations  may  be  established  by  fable  as  well 
as  by  fact.  There  is  but  little  reason  to  believe 
the  old  legendary  tale,  first  recorded  by  Rowe,  that 
Shakespeare,  having  robbed  the  deer  park  of  Sir 
Thomas  Lucy,  of  Charlecote,  was  so  severely  pros- 
ecuted by  that  magistrate  that  he  was  compelled 
to  quit  Stratford  and  shelter  himself  in  London. 
Yet  the  story  has  twisted  itself  into  all  the  lives 
of  Shakespeare,  and  whether  received  or  rejected, 
has  clung  till  this  day  to  the  house  of  Charlecote. 
That  noble  mansion  —  a  genuine  specimen,  despite 
a  few  modern  alterations,  of  the  architecture  of 
Queen  Elizabeth's  time  —  is  found  on  the  western 
bank  of  the  Avon,  about  three  miles  southwest 
from  Stratford.  It  is  a  long,  rambling,  three- 
storied  palace  —  quite  as  finely  quaint  as  old  St. 
James's  in  London,  and  not  altogether  unlike  that 
edifice  in  general  character  —  with  octagon  turrets, 
gables,  balustrades,  Tudor  casements,  and  great 
stacks  of  chimneys,  so  densely  closed  in  by  elms 
of  giant  growth  that  you  can  scarce  distinguish  it 
through  the  foliage  till  you  are  close  upon  it.  It 
was  erected  in  1558  by  Thomas  Lucy,  who  in  1578 
was  sheriff  of  Warwickshire,  and  who  was  knighted 
by  Queen  Elizabeth  in  1593.  There  is  a  silly, 
wretched  old  ballad  in  existence,  attributed  to 
Shakespeare,  which,  it  is  said,  was  found  affixed 
to  Lucy's  park  gate,  and  gave  him  great  offense. 


'\ 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  145 

He  must  liave  heen  more  tlmn  commonly  sensitive 
to  low  abuse  if  lie  could  really  have  been  annoyed 
by  such  a  manifestly  scurrilous  ebullition  of  the 
blackguard  and  the  blockhead  — supposing,  indeed, 
that  he  ever  saw  it.  In  it  he  is  called  a  "knight," 
which,  in  fact,  he  did  not  become  until  at  least  five 
years  after  the  time  when  this  precious  document 
is  alleged  to  have  been  written.  The  writing,  prof- 
fered as  the  work  .of  Shakespeare,  is  undoubtedly  a 
forgery.  There  is  but  one  existing  reason  to  think 
that  the  poet  ever  cherished  a  grudge  against  the 
Lucy  family,  and  that  is  the  coarse  allusion  to  the 
name  which  is  found  in  the  "  Merry  Wives  of  Wind- 
sor." There  was,  apparently,  a  second  Sir  Thomas 
Lucy,  later  than  the  sheriff,  who  was  still  more 
of  the  Puritanic  breed,  while  Shakespeare,  evi- 
dently, was  a  Cavalier.  It  is  possible  that  in  a 
youthful  frolic  the  poet  may  have  poached  on 
Sheriff  Lucy's  preserves.  Even  so,  the  aflair  was 
extremely  trivial.  It  is  possible,  too,  that  in  after 
vears  he  may  have  had  reason  to  dislike  the  extra- 
Puritanical  neighbour.  Some  memory  of  the  tradi- 
tion will,  of  course,  haunt  the  traveller's  thoughts 
as  he  strolls  by  Hatton  Rock  and  through  the  anti- 
quated villages  of  Hampton  and  Charlecote.  and  up 
the  broad  leafy  avenue  to  Charlecote  House.  But 
this  discordant  recollection  is  soon  smoothed  away 
by  the  peaceful  loveliness  of  the  ramble  —  past 
aged  hawthorns  that  Shakespeare  himself  must 
have  seen,  and  under  the.  boughs  of  beeches,  limes, 

10 


146  The  Trip  to  England. 

and  drooping  willows,  where  every  footstep  falls  on 
wild  flowers,  or  on  a  cool  green  turf  that  is  softer 
than  Indian  silk  and  as  firm  and  springy  as  the 
sands  of  the  sea-beaten  shore.  Thought  of  Sir 
Thomas  Lucy  will  not  be  otherwise  than  kind, 
neither,  when  the  stranger  in  Charlecote  church 
reads  the  epitaph  wUh  which  the  old  knight  hiiti- 
self  commemorated  his  wife :  "  All  the  time  of  her 
life  a  true  and  faithful  servant  of  her  good  God  ; 
never  detected  of  any  crime  or  vice ;  in  religion 
most  sound  ;  in  love  to  her  husband  most  faithful 
and  true  ;  in  friendship  most  constant ;  to  what  in 
trust  was  committed  to  her  most  secret ;  in  wis- 
dom excelling  ;  in  governing  her  house  and  bring- 
ing up  of  youth  in  the  fear  of  God  that  did  converse 
with  her  most  rare  and  singular.  A  great  main- 
tainer  of  hospitality  ;  greatly  esteemed  of  her  bet- 
ters ;  misliked  of  none,  unless  of  the  envious.  When 
all  is  spoken  that  can  be  said,  a  woman  so  furnished 
and  garnished  with  virtue  as  not  to  be  bettered,  and 
hardly  to  be  equalled  of  any.  As  she  lived  most 
virtuously,  so  she  died  most  godly.  Set  down  by 
him  that  best  did  know  what  hath  been  written  to 
be  true,  Thomas  Lucy."  A  narrow  formalist  he 
may  have  been,  and  a  severe  magistrate  in  his  deal- 
ings with  scapegrace  youths,  and  perhaps  a  haughty 
and  disagreeable  neighbour ;  but  there  is  a  touch  of 
genuine  manhood,  high  feeling,  and  virtuous  and 
self-respecting  character  in  these  lines  which  in- 
stantly wins  the  response  of  sympathy.     If  Shakes- 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  1 4  7 

pearc  really  shot  the  deer  of  Thomas  Lucy,  tlie 
injured  gentleman  had  a  right  to  feel  annoyed. 
Shakespeare,  boy  or  man,  was  not  a  saint,  and 
those  who  so  account  him  can  have  read  his  works 
to  but  little  purpose.  He  can  bear  the  full  brunt  of 
all  his  faults.     He  does  not  need  to  be  canonized. 

This  ramble  to  Charlecote  —  one  of  the  prettiest 
walks  about  Stratford  —  was,  it  may  surely  be  sui> 
posed,  often  taken  by  Shakespeare.  He  would  pass 
the  old  mill  bridge  (new  in  1599),  which  still  spans 
the  Avon  a  little  way  to  the  south  of  the  church. 
The  quaint,  sleepy  mill  — clad  now  with  moss  and 
ivy  —  which  adds  such  a  charm  to  the  prospect,  was 
doubtless  fresh  and  bright  in  those  distant  days. 
More  lovely  to  the  vision,  though,  it  never  could 
have  been  than  it  is  at  present.  The  gaze  of 
Shakespeare  assuredly  dwelt  on  it  with  pleasure. 
His  footsteps  may  be  traced,  also,  in  fancy,  to  the 
region  of  the  old  college  building  (demolished  in 
1799),  which  stood  in  the  southern  part  of  Strat- 
ford, and  was  the  home  of  his  friend  John  Combe, 
factor  of  Fulke  Greville,  Earl  of  Warwick.  Still 
another  of  his  walks  must  have  tended  north- 
ward through  Welcombe,  where  he  was  the  owner 
of  lands,  to  the  portly  manor  of  Clopton.  On  what 
is  called  the  "Ancient  House,"  which  stands  on 
the  west  side  of  High  Street,  not  far  from  New 
Place,  he  may  often  have  looked,  as  he  strolled 
past  to  the  inns  of  the  Boar  and  the  Red  Horse. 
This  building,  dated  1596,  survives,  notwithstand- 


148  The  Trip  to  England. 

ing  some  modern  touches  of  rehabilitation,  as  a 
beautiful  specimen  of  Tudor  architecture  in  one  at 
least  of  its  most  charming  features,  the  carved  and 
timber-crossed  gable.  It  is  a  house  of  three  stories, 
containing  parlour,  sitting-room,  kitchen,  and  several 
bedrooms,  besides  cellars  and  brew-shed  ;  and  when 
sold  at  auction,  August  23d,  1876,  it  brought  £^06. 
There  are  other  dwellings  fully  as  old  in  Stratford, 
but  they  have  been  newly  painted  and  otherwise 
changed.  This  is  a  genuine  piece  of  antiquity,  and 
vies  with  the  grammar  school  of  the  guild,  under 
whose  pent-house  the  poet  could  not  have  failed  to 
pass  whenever  he  went  abroad  from  New  Place. 
Julius  Shaw,  one  of  the  five  witnesses  to  his  will, 
lived  in  a  house  close  by  the  grammar  school  ;  and 
here,  it  is  reasonable  to  think,  Shakespeare  would 
often  pause  for  a  chat  with  his  friend  and  neigh- 
bour. In  all  the  little  streets  by  the  river-side, 
which  are  ancient  and  redolent  of  the  past,  his 
image  seems  steadily  familiar.  In  Dead  Lane 
(now  called  Chapel  Lane)  he  owned  a  little,  low 
cottage,  bought  of  Walter  Getley  in  1602,  and  only 
destroyed  within  the  present  century.  These  and 
kindred  shreds  of  fact,  suggesting  the  poet  as  a 
living  man,  and  connecting  him,  howsoever  vaguely, 
with  our  human,  every-day  experience,  are  seized 
on  with  peculiar  zest  by  the  pilgrim  in  Stratford. 
Such  a  votary,  for  example,  never  doubts  that 
Shakespeare  was  a  frequenter,  in  leisure  and  con- 
vivial hours,  of   the  ancient   Red   Horse   Inn.     It 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  149 

stood  there  in  his  day  as  it  stands  now,  on  the 
right-hand  side  of  Bridge  street,  westward  from 
the  Avon.  There  are  many  other  taverns  in  the 
town  —  the  Sliakespeare,  the  Falcon,  the  White 
Hart,  the  Rose  and  Crown,  the  old  Red  Lion,  and 
the  Cross  Keys  being  a  few  of  them  —  but  the  Red 
Horse  takes  precedence  of  all  its  kindred,  in  the 
fascinating,  because  suggestive,  attribute  of  antiq- 
uity. Moreover,  it  was  the  Red  Horse  that  har- 
boured Washington  Irving,  the  pioneer  of  American 
worshippers  at  the  shrine  of  Shakespeare  ;  and  the 
American  explorer  of  Stratford  would  cruelly  sacri- 
fice his  peace  of  mind  if  he  were  to  repose  under 
any  other  roof.  The  Red  Horse  is  a  rambling, 
three-story  building,  entered  through  a  large  arch- 
way, which  leads  into  a  long,  straggling  yard,  adja- 
cent to  many  offices  and  stables.  On  one  side  of 
the  hall  of  entrance  is  found  the  smoking-room  and 
bar ;  on  the  other  are  the  coffee-room  and  several 
sitting-rooms.  Above  arc  the  chambers.  It  is  a 
thoroughly  old-fashioned  inn  —  such  a  one  as  we 
may  suppose  the  Boar's  Head  to  have  been,  in  the 
time  of  Prince  Henry;  such  a  one  as  untravelled 
Americans  only  know  in  the  pages  of  Dickens. 
The  rooms  are  furnished  in  plain  and  homely  style, 
but  their  associations  readily  deck  them  with  the 
fragrant  garlands  of  memory.  When  Drayton  and 
Jonson  came  down  to  visit  "gentle  Will"  at  Strat- 
ford, they  could  scarcely  have  omitted  to  quaff  the 
glorious  ale  of  Warwickshire  in  this  cosey  parlour. 


150  The  Trip  to  England. 

When  Queen  Henrietta  Maria  was  ensconced  at 
New  Place,  the  Iionoured  guest  of  Shakespeare's 
elder  and  favourite  daughter,  the  general  of  the  royal 
forces  quartered  himself  at  the  Red  Horse,  and 
then  doubtless  there  was  enough  and  to  spare  of 
merry  revelry  within  its  walls.  A  little  later  the 
old  house  was  soundly  peppered  by  the  Roundhead' 
bullets,  and  the  whole  town  was  overrun  with  the 
close-cropped,  psalm-singing  soldiers  of  the  Com- 
monwealth. In  1742  Garrick  and  Mackhn  lodged 
in  the  Red  Horse,  and  hither  again  came  Garrick 
in  1769,  to  direct  the  great  Shakespeare  Jubilee, 
which  was  then  most  dismally  accomplished,  but 
which  is  always  remembered  to  the  great  actor's 
credit  and  honour.  Betterton,  no  doubt,  lodged  here 
when  he  came  to  Stratford  in  quest  of  reminiscences 
of  Shakespeare.  The  visit  of  Irving,  supplemented 
with  his  delicious  chronicle,  has  led  to  what  might 
be  called  almost  the  consecration  of  the  parlour  in 
which  he  sat  and  the  chamber  in  which  he  slept. 
They  still  keep  the  poker  — now  marked  "  Geoffrey 
Crayon's  sceptre"  —  with  which,  as  he  sat  there  in 
long,  silent,  and  ecstatic  meditation,  he  so  ruthlessly 
prodded  the  fire  in  the  narrow,  tiny  grate.  They 
keep  also  the  chair  in  which  he  sat  —  a  plain, 
straight-backed  arm-chair,  with  a  hair-cloth  seat, 
much  worn  in  these  latter  days  by  the  incumbent 
devotions  of  the  faithful,  but  duly  marked,  on  a 
brass  label,  with  his  renowned  and  treasured  name. 
Thus  genius  can  sanctify  even  the  humblest  objects, 


\ 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  1 5 1 

"  And  shed  a  somethinc;  of  celestial  li.;ht 
Round  the  familiar  face  of  every  day." 

To  pass  rapidly  in  review  the  little  that  is  known 
of  Shakespeare's  life  is,  nevertheless,  to  be  im- 
pressed not  only  by  its  incessant  and  amazing  liter- 
ary productiveness,  but  by  the  quick  succession  of 
its  salient  incidents.  The  vitality  must  have  been 
enormous  that  created  in  so  short  a  time  such  a 
number  and  variety  of  works  of  the  first  class.  The 
same  "quick  spirit"  would  naturally  have  kept  in 
asitation  all  the  elements  of  his  dailv  experience. 
Descended  from  an  ancestor  who  had  fought  for  the 
Red  Rose  on  Bosworth  Field,  he  was  born  to  re- 
pute as  well  as  competence,  and  during  his  early 
childhood  he  received  instruction  and  training  in  a 
comfortable  home.  He  escaped  the  plague,  which 
was  rasrintr  in  Stratford  when  he  was  an  infant,  and 
which  took  many  victims.  He  went  to  school 
when  seven  years  old,  and  left  it  when  about  four- 
teen. He  then  had  to  work  for  his  living  —  his 
once  opulent  father  having  fallen  into  misfortune  — 
and  he  became  an  apprentice  to  a  butcher,  or  else  a 
lawyer's  clerk  (there  were  seven  lawyers  in  Strat- 
ford at  that  time),  or  else  a  school-teacher.  Per- 
haps he  was  all  three  —  and  more.  It  is  conjectured 
that  he  saw  the  players  who  from  time  to  time 
acted  in  the  Guildhall,  under  the  auspices  of  the 
corporation  of  Stratford;  that  he  attended  the  relig- 
ious entertainments  which  were  customarily  given 
in  the  neighbouring  city  of  Coventry  ;  and  that  in 


152  The  Trip  to  England.  ' 

particular  he  witnessed  the  elaborate  and  sumptuous 
pageants  with  which  in  1575  the  Earl  of  Leicester 
welcomed  Queen  Elizabeth  to  Kenilworth  Castle. 
He  married  at  eighteen ;  and,  leaving  a  wife  and 
three  children  in  Stratford,  he  went  up  to  London 
at  twenty-two.  His  entrance  into  tlieatrical  life 
immediately  followed  —  in  what  capacity  it  is  impos- 
sible to  judge.  One  dubious  account  says  that  he 
held  horses  for  the  public  at  the  theatre  door; 
another  that  he  got  employment  as  a  prompter  to 
the  actors.  It  is  certain  that  he  had  not  been  in 
the  theatrical  business  long  before  he  beiran  to 
make  himself  felt.  At  twenty-eight  he  was  known 
as  a  prosperous  author.  At  twenty-nine  he  had 
acted  with  Burbage  before  Queen  Elizabeth;  and 
while  Spenser  had  extolled  him  in  the  "  Tears  of 
the  Muses,"  the  envious  Green  had  disparaged  him 
in  the  "  Groat's-worth  of  Wit."  At  thirty-three  he 
had  acquired  wealth  enough  to  purchase  New 
Place,  the  principal  residence  in  his  native  town, 
where  now  he  placed  his  family  and  established 
his  home,  —  himself  remaining  in  London,  but  visit- 
ing Stratford  at  frequent  intervals.  At  thirty-four 
he  was  heard  of  as  the  actor  of  Knowell  in  Ben 
Jonson's  comedy,  then  new,  of  "  Every  Man  in  his 
Humour,"  and  he  received  the  glowing  encomium  of 
Meres  in  "Wit's  Treasury."  At  thirty-eight  he 
had  written  "Hamlet"  and  "As  You  Like  It," 
and,  moreover,  he  was  now  become  the  owner  of 
more    estate    in    Stratford,  costing   him  ;^32o.     At 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  153 

forty-one  he  made  his  larpjest  purchase,  buying  for 
/440  the  tithes  of  Stratford,  Old  Stratford,  liishop- 
toii,  and  Wclconibe.  In  the  mean  time  lie  had 
smoothed  the  declining  years  of  his  fatiicr,  and  liad 
followed  him  with  love  and  duty  to  the  grave. 
Other  domestic  bereavements  likewise  befell  him, 
and  other  worldly  cares  and  duties  were  laid  upon 
his  hands,  but  neither  grief  nor  business  could 
check  the  fertility  of  his  brain.  Within  the  next 
ten  years  he  wrote,  among  other  great  plays, 
"  Othello,"  "  Lear,"  "  .Macbeth,"  and  "  Coriolanus." 
At  about  forty-eight  he  seems  to  have  disposed  of 
his  shares  in  the  two  London  theatres  with  which 
he  had  been  connected,  the  Blackfriars  and  the 
Globe,  and  shortly  afterward,  his  work  as  we  pos- 
sess it  being  well-nigh  completed,  he  retired  finally 
to  his  Stratford  home.  That  he  was  the  comrade 
of  all  the  bright  spirits  who  glittered  in  "the  spa- 
cious times  "  of  Elizabeth,  many  of  them  have  left 
their  personal  testimony.  That  he  was  the  king  of 
them  all,  is  evidenced  in  his  works.  The  Sonnets 
seem  to  disclose  that  there  was  a  mysterious, 
almost  a  tragical,  passage  in  his  life,  and  that  he 
was  called  to  bear  the  secret  burden  of  a  great  and 
perhaps  a  calamitous  personal  grief — one  of  those 
griefs,  too,  which,  being  germinated  by  sin,  are  end- 
less in  the  punishment  they  entail.  Happily,  how- 
ever, no  antiquarian  student  of  Shakespeare's  time 
has  yet  succeeded  in  coming  very  near  to  the  man. 
While  he  was  in   London  he  used  to  frequent  the 


154  The  Trip  to  England.  ' 

Falcon  Tavern  and  the  Mermaid,  and  he  lived  at 
one  time  in  Bishopsgate  street,  and  at  another  time 
in  Clink  street,  in  South wark.  As  an  actor  his 
name  has  been  associated  with  his  own  characters 
of  Adam,  Friar  Lawrence,  and  the  Ghost  of  King 
Hamlet,  and  a  contemporary  reference  declared  him 
"excellent  in  the  quality  he  professes."  Many'of 
his  manuscripts,  it  is  probable,  perished  in  the  fire 
which  consumed  the  Globe  Theatre,  in  1613.  He 
passed  his  last  days  in  his  home  at  Stratford,  and 
died  there,  somewhat  suddenly,  on  his  fifty-second 
birth-day.  This  event,  it  may  be  worth  while  to 
observe,  occurred  within  thirty-three  years  of  the 
execution  of  Charles  the  First,  under  the  Puritan 
Commonwealth  of  Oliver  Cromwell.  The  Puritan 
spirit,  intolerant  of  the  play-house  and  of  all  its 
works,  must  even  then  have  been  gaining  formida- 
ble strength.  His  daughter  Judith,  aged  thirty-two 
at  the  time  of  his  death,  survived  him  forty-six 
years,  and  the  whisper  of  tradition  says  that  she 
was  a  Puritan.  If  so,  the  strange  and  seemingly 
unaccountable  disappearance  of  whatever  play-house 
papers  he  may  have  left  behind  him  at  Stratford 
should  not  be  obscure.  The  suggestion  is  likely 
to  have  been  made  before ;  and  also  it  is  likely  to 
have  been  supplemented  with  a  reference  to  the 
great  fire  in  London  in  1666  —  (which  in  consum- 
in"-  St.  Paul's  Cathedral  burned  an  immense  quan- 
tity of  books  and  manuscripts  that  had  been 
brought  from  all  the  threatened  parts  of  the  city  and 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  155 

heaped  beneath  its  arches  for  safety)  —  as  probably 
the  final  and  effectual  holocaust  of  almost  every 
piece  of  print  or  writing  that  might  have  served  to 
illuminate  the  history  of  Shakespeare.  In  his  per- 
sonality, no  less  than  in  the  fathomless  resources  of 
his  genius,  he  baffles  all  scrutiny,  and  stands  for- 
ever alone. 

"  Others  abide  our  question ;  thou  are  free  ; 
We  ask,  and  ask ;  thou  smilest  and  art  still  — 
Out-topping  knowledge." 

It  is  impossible  to  convey  in  words  even  an  ade- 
quate suggestion  of  the  prodigious  and  overwhelm- 
ing sense  of  peace  that  falls  upon  the  soul  of  the 
pilgrim  in  Stratford  church.  All  the  cares  and 
struggles  and  trials  of  mortal  life,  all  its  failures, 
and  equally  ail  its  achievements,  seem  there  to  pass 
utterly  out  of  remembrance.  It  is  not  now  an  idle 
reflection  that  "  the  paths  of  glory  lead  but  to  the 
grave."  No  power  of  human  thought  ever  rose 
higher  or  went  further  than  the  thought  of  Shake- 
speare. No  human  being,  using  the  best  weapons 
of  intellectual  achievement,  ever  accomplished  so 
much.  Yet  here  he  lies  —  who  was  once  so  great ! 
And  here  also,  gathered  around  him  in  death,  lie 
his  parents,  his  children,  his  descendants,  and  his 
friends.  For  him  and  for  them  the  struggle  has 
Ions  since  ended.  Let  no  man  fear  to  tread  the 
dark  pathway  that  Shakespeare  has  trodden  before 
him.     Let  no  man,  standing  at  this  grave,  and  see- 


156  The  Trip  to  England. 

inland  feelinoftliat  all  the  vast  labours  of  that  celes- 
tial  senius  end  here  at  last  in  a  handful  of  dust,  fret 
and  grieve  any  more  over  the  puny  and  evanescent 
toils  of  to-day,  so  soon  to  be  buried  in  oblivion ! 
In  the  simple  performance  of  duty,  and  in  the  life 
of  the  affections,  there  may  be  permanence  and 
solace.  The  rest  is  an  "  unsubstantial  pageant." 
It  breaks,  it  changes,  it  dies,  it  passes  away,  it  is 
forgotten  ;  and  though  a  great  name  be  now  and 
then  for  a  little  while  remembered,  what  can  the  re- 
membrance of  mankind  signify  to  him  who  once 
wore  it  t  Shakespeare,  there  is  good  reason  to  be- 
lieve, set  precisely  the  right  value  alike  upon  re- 
nown in  his  own  time  and  the  homage  of  posterity. 
Though  he  went  forth,  as  the  stormy  impulses  of  his 
nature  drove  him,  into  the  great  world  of  London, 
and  there  laid  the  firm  hand  of  conquest  upon  the 
spoils  of  wealth  and  power,  he  came  back  at  last  to 
the  peaceful  home  of  his  childhood ;  he  strove  to 
garner  up  the  comforts  and  everlasting  treasures  of 
love  at  his  own  hearth-stone;  he  sought  an  enduring 
monument  in  the  hearts  of  friends  and  companions; 
and  so  he  won  for  his  stately  sepulchre  the  garland 
not  alone  of  glory,  but  of  affection.  Through  the 
tall  eastern  window  of  the  chancel  of  Holy  Trinity 
Church  the  morning  sunshine,  broken  into  many- 
coloured  light,  streams  in  upon  the  grave  of  Shake- 
speare, and  gilds  his  bust  upon  the  wall  above  it. 
He  lies  close  by  the  altar,  and  every  circumstance 
of  his  place  of  burial  is  eloquent  of  his  hold  upon 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  157 

the  affectionate  esteem  of  his  contemporaries, 
equally  as  a  man,  a  Christian,  and  a  famous  poet. 
The  line  of  graves  beginning  at  the  north  wall  of 
the  chancel,  and  extending  across  to  the  south, 
seems  devoted  entirely  to  Shakespeare  and  his  fam- 
ily, with  but  one  exception.  The  pavement  that 
covers  them  is  of  that  bluish-gray  slate  or  free- 
stone which  in  England  is  sometimes  called  black 
marble.  Beneath  it  there  are  vaults  which  may 
have  been  constructed  by  the  monks  when  this 
church  was  built,  far  back  in  the  eleventh  or  twelfth 
century.  In  the  first  of  these,  under  the  north  wall, 
rests  Shakespeare's  wife.  The  next  is  that  of  the 
poet  himself,  bearing  the  world-famed  words  of  bles- 
sing and  imprecation.  Then  comes  the  grave  of 
Thomas  Nashe,  husband  to  Elizabeth  Hall,  the 
poet's  granddaughter.  Next  is  that  of  Dr.  John 
Hall,  husband  to  his  daughter  Susanna,  and  close 
beside  him  rests  Susanna  herself.  The  grave-stones 
are  laid  east  and  west,  and  all  but  one  present  in- 
scriptions. That  one  is  under  the  south  wall,  and, 
possibly,  covers  the  dust  of  Judith  —  j\lrs.  Thomas 
Ouiney  —  the  youngest  daughter  of  Shakespeare, 
who,  surviving  her  three  children,  and  thus  leaving 
no  descendants,  died  in  1662.  Upon  the  grave- 
stone of  Susanna  an  inscription  has  been  intruded 
commemorative  of  Richard  Watts,  who  is  not,  how- 
ever, known  to  have  had  any  relationship  with  either 
Shakespeare  or  his  descendants.  The  remains  of 
many  other  persons  may  perhaps  be  entombed  in 


158  The  Trip  to  England. 

these  vaults.  Shakespeare's  father,  who  died  in 
1661,  and  his  mother,  Mary  Arden,  who  died  in  1608, 
were  buried  somewhere  in  this  church.  His  infant 
sisters  Joan,  Margaret,  and  Anne,  and  his  brother 
Richard,  who  died,  aged  thirty-nine,  in  161 3,  may 
also  have  been  laid  to  rest  in  this  place.  Of  the 
death  and  burial  of  liis  brother  Gilbert  there  is  rio 
record.  His  sister  Joan,  the  second  —  Mrs.  Hart 
—  would  naturally  have  been  placed  with  her  rela- 
tives. His  brother  Edmund,  dying  in  1607,  aged 
twenty-seven,  is  under  the  pavement  of  St.  Saviour's 
Church  in  Southwark.  The  boy  Hamnet,  dying  be- 
fore his  father  had  risen  into  much  local  eminence, 
rests,  probably,  in  an  undistinguished  grave  in  the 
church-yard.  The  family  of  Shakespeare  seems  to 
have  been  short-lived,  and  it  was  soon  extinguished. 
He  himself  died  at  fifty-two.  Judith's  children  all 
perished  young.  Susanna  bore  but  one  child  — 
Elizabeth  —  who,  as  already  mentioned,  became 
successively  Mrs.  Nashe  and  Lady  Barnard,  and 
she,  dying  in  1670,  was  buried  at  Abington.  She 
left  no  children  by  either  husband,  and  in  her  the 
race  of  Shakespeare  became  extinct.  That  of 
Anne  Hathaway  also  has  nearly  disappeared,  the 
last  living  descendant  of  the  Hathaways  being  Mrs. 
Taylor,  the  present  occupant  of  Anne's  cottage  at 
Shottery.  Thus,  one  by  one,  from  the  pleasant 
gardened  town  of  Stratford,  they  went  to  take  up 
their  long  abode  in  that  old  church,  which  was 
ancient  even  in  their  infancy,  and  which,  watching 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  159 

througli  the  centuries  in  its  monastic  solitude  on  the 
shore  of  Avon,  has  seen  tlieir  lands  and  houses 
devastated  by  flood  and  fire,  the  places  that  knew 
them  changed  by  tiie  tooth  of  time,  and  almost  all 
the  associations  of  their  lives  obliterated  by  the 
improving  hand  of  destruction. 

One  of  the  oldest  and  most  interesting  Shake- 
spearean documents  in  existence  is  the  narrative,  by 
a  traveller  named  Dowdall,  of  his  observations  in 
Warwickshire,  and  of  his  visit  on  April  10,  1693,  to 
Stratford  church.  He  describes  therein  the  bust 
and  the  tomb-stone  of  Shakespeare,  and  he  adds 
these  remarkable  words:  "  The  clerk  that  showed 
me  this  church  is  above  eighty  years  old.  He  says 
that  not  one,  for  fear  of  the  curse  above  said,  dare 
touch  his  grave-stone,  though  his  wife  and  daughter 
did  earnestly  desire  to  be  laid  in  the  same  grave 
with  him."  Writers  in  modern  days  have  been 
pleased  to  disparage  that  inscription,  and  to  con- 
jecture that  it  was  the  work  of  a  sexton,  and  not  of 
the  poet ;  but  no  one  denies  that  it  has  accomplished 
its  purpose  in  preserving  the  sanctity  of  Shake- 
speare's rest.  Its  rugged  strength,  its  simple 
pathos,  its  fitness,  and  its  sincerity  make  it  felt  as 
unquestionably  the  utterance  of  Shakespeare  him- 
self, when  it  is  read  upon  the  slab  that  covers  him. 
There  the  musing  traveller  full  well  conceives  how 
dearly  the  poet  must  have  loved  the  beautiful 
scenes  of  his  birth-place,  and  with  what  intense 
longing  he  must  have  desired  to  sleep  undisturbed 


i6o  The  Trip  to  England. 

in  the  most  sacred  spot  in  their  bosom.  He  doubt- 
less had  some  premonition  of  his  approaching  death. 
Three  months  before  it  came  he  drafted  his  will.  A 
httle  later  he  attended  to  the  marriage  of  his 
younger  daughter.  Within  less  than  a  month  of 
his  death  he  executed  the  will,  and  thus  set  his 
affairs  in  perfect  order.  His  handwriting  in  the 
three  signatures  to  that  paper  conspicuously  exhibits 
the  uncertainty  and  lassitude  of  shattered  nerves. 
He  was  probably  quite  worn  out.  Within  the 
space,  at  the  utmost,  of  twenty- five  years,  he  had 
written  his  thirty-seven  plays,  his  one  hundred  and 
fifty-four  sonnets,  and  his  two  or  more  long  poems ; 
had  passed  through  much  and  painful  toil  and 
through  many  sorrows  ;  had  made  his  fortune  as  au- 
thor, actor,  and  manager;  and  had  superintended, 
to  excellent  advantage,  his  property  in  London  and 
his  large  estates  in  Stratford  and  its  neighbourhood. 
The  proclamation  of  health  with  whicli  the  will 
begins  was  doubtless  a  formality  of  legal  custom. 
The  story  that  he  died  of  drinking  too  hard  at  a 
merry  meeting  with  Drayton  and  Ben  Jonson  is 
the  merest  hearsay  and  gossip.  If  in  those  last 
days  of  fatigue  and  presentiment  he  wrote  the 
epitaph  that  has  ever  since  marked  his  grave,  it 
would  naturally  have  taken  the  plainest  fashion  of 
speech.  Such,  at  all  events,  is  its  character;  and 
no  pilgrim  to  the  poet's  shrine  could  wish  to  see  it 
changed : — 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  1 6  [ 

"  Good  frend  for  lesvs  sake  forbeare, 
To  digg  the  dvst  encloased  hearc  ; 
Blese  be  y«  man  y'  spares  thes  stones 
And  cvrst  be  he  y'  moves  my  bonis." 

It  was  once  surmised  that  tlie  poet's  solicitucle 
lest  his  bones  might  be  disturbed  in  death  grew  out 
of  his  intention  to  take  with  him  into  the  grave  a 
confession  that  the  works  which  now  "follow  him'' 
were  written  by  another  hand.  Persons  have  been 
found  who  actually  believe  that  a  man  who  was 
great  enough  to  write  "  Hamlet "  could  be  little 
enough  to  feel  ashamed  of  it,  and,  accordingly,  that 
Shakespeare  was  only  hired  to  play  at  authorship 
as  a  screen  for  the  actual  author.  It  mi^ht  not, 
perhaps,  be  strange  that  a  desire  for  singularity, 
which  is  one  of  the  worst  literary  fashions  of  this 
capricious  age,  should  prompt  to  the  rejection  of 
the  conclusive  and  overwhelming  testimony  to 
Shakespeare's  genius  which  has  been  left  by  Shake- 
speare's contemporaries,  and  which  shines  out  in 
all  that  is  known  of  his  life.  It  is  stranjre  that  a 
doctrine  should  get  itself  asserted  which  is  subver- 
sive of  common  reason,  and  contradictory  to  every 
known  law  of  the  human  mind.  This  conjectural 
confession  of  poetic  imposture,  of  course,  has  never 
been  exhumed.  There  came  a  time  in  the  present 
century  when,  as  they  were  making  repairs  in  the 
chancel  pavement  of  the  Holy  Trinity  (the  entire 
chancel  was  renovated  in  1834),  a  rift  was  acciden- 
tally made  in  the  Shakespeare  vault.     Through  this, 

II 


1 62  The  Trip  to  Eii gland. 

though  not  without  misgiving,  the  sexton  peeped  in 
upon  the  poet's  remains.  He  saw  all  that  was 
there,  and  he  saw  nothing  but  a  pile  of  dust. 

The  antique  font  from  which  the  infant  Shake- 
speare must  have  received  the  sacred  water  of  Chris- 
tian baptism  is  still  preserved  in  this  church.  It 
was  thrown  aside  and  replaced  by  a  new  one  about 
the  middle  of  the  seventeenth  century.  Many 
years  afterward  it  was  found  in  the  charnel-house. 
When  that  was  destroyed,  it  was  cast  into  the 
church-yard.  In  later  times  the  parish  clerk  used 
it  as  a  trough  to  his  pump.  It  passed  then  through 
the  hands  of  several  successive  owners,  till  at  last, 
in  days  that  had  learned  to  value  the  past  and  the 
associations  connected  with  its  illustrious  names,  it 
found  its  way  back  again  to  the  sanctuary  from 
which  it  had  suffered  such  a  rude  expulsion.  It  is 
still  a  beautiful  stone,  though  somewhat  soiled  and 
crumbled. 

On  the  north  wall  of  the  chancel,  above  his  grave, 
and  near  to  "the  American  window,"  is  placed 
Shakespeare's  monument.  It  is  known  to  have 
been  erected  there  within  seven  years  after  his 
death.  It  consists  of  a  half-length  effigy,  placed 
beneath  a  fretted  arch,  with  entablature  and  pedes- 
tal, between  two  Corinthian  columns  of  black  mar- 
ble, gilded  at  base  and  top.  Above  the  entablature 
appear  the  armorial  bearings  of  Shakespeare  —  a 
pointed  spear  on  a  bend  sable,  and  a  silver  falcon 
on  a  tasselled  helmet,   supporting  a  spear.     Over 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  163 

this  heraldic  emblem  is  a  death's-head,  and  on  each 
side  of  it  sits  a  carven  cherub,  one  holding  a  spade, 
the  other  an  inverted  torch.  In  front  of  the  effigy 
is  a  cushion,  upon  which  both  hands  rest,  holding  a 
scroll  and  a  pen.  Beneath  is  an  inscription  in  Latin 
and  English,  supposed  to  have  been  furnished  by 
the  poet's  son-in  law,  Dr.  Hall.  The  bust  was  cut 
by  Gerard  Johnson,  a  native  of  Amsterdam,  and  by 
occupation  a  "  tomb-maker.''  The  material  is  a  soft 
stone,  and  the  work,  when  first  set  up,  was  painted 
in  the  colours  of  life.  Its  peculiarities  indicate  that 
it  was  copied  from  a  mask  of  the  features  taken 
after  death.  Many  persons  believe  that  this  mask 
has  since  been  found,  and  busts  of  Shakespeare 
have  tieen  based  upon  it.  both  by  W.  R.  O' Donovan 
and  William  Page.  In  September,  1746,  John  Ward, 
grandfather  of  Mrs.  Siddons.  having  come  to  Strat- 
ford with  a  theatrical  company,  gave  a  performance 
of  "  Othello,''  in  the  Guildhall,  and  devoted  its  pro- 
ceeds to  reparation  of  the  Gerard  Johnson  effigy, 
then  somewhat  damaged  by  time.  The  original 
colours  were  then  carefully  restored  and  freshened. 
In  1793,  under  the  direction  of  Malone,  this  bust, 
together  with  the  image  of  John  Combe  —  a  recum- 
bent statue  near  the  eastern  wall  of  the  chancel  — 
was  coated  with  white  paint.  From  that  plight  it 
was  extricated  a  few  years  ago  by  the  assiduous 
skill  of  Simon  Collins,  who  immersed  it  in  a  bath 
which  took  off  the  white  paint  and  restored  the  col- 
ours.   The  eyes  are  painted  of  a  light  hazel,  the  hair 


164  The  Trip  to  England. 

and  pointed  beard  of  auburn,  the  face  and  hands 
of  flesh-tint.  The  dress  consists  of  a  scarlet 
doublet  with  a  rolling  collar,  and  closely  buttoned 
down  the  front,  worn  under  a  loose  black  gown 
without  sleeves.  The  upper  part  of  the  cushion  is 
green,  the  lower  part  crimson,  and  this  object  is 
ornamented  with  gilt  tassels.  The  stone  pen  that 
used  to  be  in  the  right  hand  of  the  bust  was  taken 
from  it  toward  the  end  of  the  last  century  by  a 
young  Oxford  student,  and  being  dropped  by  him 
upon  the  pavement,  was  broken.  A  quill  pen  has 
been  put  in  its  place.  This  is  the  inscription  be- 
neath the  bust : — 

Ivdicio  Pylivm,  genio  Socratem,  arte  Maronem, 
Terra  tegit,  popvlvs  m^ret,  Olympvs  habet. 

Stay,  passenger,  why  goest  thov  by  so  fast  ? 
Read,  if  thov  canst,  whom  enviovs  Death  hath  plast 
Within  this  monvment :   Shakspeare  :  with  whonie 
Qvick  Natvre  dide ;  whose  name  doth  deck  y'  tombe 
Far  more  than  cost ;  sieth  all  y'  he  hath  writt 
Leaves  living  art  bvt  page  to  serve  his  witt. 

Obiit  Ano.  Doi.  1616.  ^tatis  53.    Die.  23.  Ap. 

The  erection  of  the  old  castles,  cathedrals,  monas- 
teries, and  churches  of  England  must,  of  course, 
have  been  accomplished,  little  by  little,  in  laborious 
exertion  protracted  through  many  years.  Stratford 
church,  probably  more  than  seven  centuries  old, 
presents  a  mixture  of  architectural  styles,  in  which 
Saxon  simplicity  and  Norman  grace  are  beautifully 


J 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  165 

mingled.  Different  parts  of  tlie  structure  were, 
doubtless,  built  at  dilTerent  times.  It  is  fashioned 
in  the  customary  crucial  form,  with  a  square  tower, 
a  si.x-sided  spire,  and  a  fretted  battlement  all  around 
its  roof.  Its  windows  are  Gothic.  The  approach 
to  it  is  across  an  old  church-yard  thickly  sown  with 
graves,  through  a  lovely  green  avenue  of  blossoming 
lime-trees,  leading  to  a  carven  porch  on  its  north 
side.  This  avenue  of  foliage  is  said  to  be  the  copy 
of  one  that  existed  there  in  Shakespeare's  day. 
through  which  he  must  often  have  walked,  and 
through  which  at  last  he  was  carried  to  his  grave. 
Time  itself  has  fallen  asleep  in  this  ancient  place. 
The  low  sob  of  the  organ  only  deepens  the  awful 
sense  of  its  silence  and  its  dreamless  repose. 
Beeches,  yews,  and  elms  grow  in  the  church-yard, 
and  many  a  low  tomb  and  many  a  leaning  stone  are 
there  in  the  shadow,  gray  with  moss  and  mouldering 
with  age.  Birds  have  built  their  nests  in  many 
crevices  in  the  time-worn  tower,  round  which  at 
sunset  you  may  see  them  circle,  with  chirp  of  greet- 
ing or  with  call  of  anxious  discontent.  Near  by 
flows  the  peaceful  river,  reflecting  the  grey  spire  in 
its  dark,  silent,  shining  waters.  In  the  long  and 
lonesome  meadows  beyond  it  the  primroses  stand 
in  their  golden  banks  among  the  clover,  and  the 
frilled  and  fluted  bell  of  the  cowslip,  hiding  its 
single  drop  of  blood  in  its  bosom,  closes  its  petals 
as  the  night  comes  down. 

Northward,  at  a  little  distance  from  the  Church 


1 66  The  Trip  to  Ej} gland. 

of  the  Holy  Trinity,  stands,  on  the  west  bank  of 
the  Avon,  the  building  which  will  henceforth  be 
famous  through  the  world  as  the  Shakespeare 
Memorial.  Its  dedication,  assigned  for  the  23d 
of  April,  1880,  has  prompted  this  glance  at  the 
hallowed  associations  of  Stratford.  The  idea  of 
the  Memorial  was  first  suggested  in  1864,  incident- 
ally to  the  ceremonies  which  then  commemorated 
the  three-hundredth  anniversary  of  the  poet's  birth. 
Ten  years  later  the  site  for  this  noble  structure  was 
presented  to  the  town  by  Charles  E.  Flower,  one  of 
its  wealthy  inhabitants.  Contributions  of  money 
were  then  asked,  and  were  liberally  given.  Ameri- 
cans as  well  as  Englishmen  gave  larw  sums.  Two 
years  ago,  on  the  23d  of  April,  the  first  stone  of  the 
Memorial  was  laid.  The  structure  comprises  a 
theatre,  a  library,  and  a  picture-gallery.  In  the 
theatre  the  plays  of  Shakespeare  are  from  time 
to  time  to  be  represented,  in  a  manner  as  nearly 
perfect  as  may  be  possible.  In  the  library  and 
picture-gallery  are  to  be  assembled  all  the  books 
upon  Shakespeare  that  ever  have  been  published, 
and  all  the  choice  paintings  that  can  be  obtained 
to  illustrate  his  life  and  his  works.  As  the  years 
pass  this  will  naturally  become  the  principal  de- 
pository of  Shakespearean  relics.  A  dramatic 
college  will  grow  up  in  association  with  the 
Shakespeare  theatre.  The  spacious  gardens  which 
surround  the  Memorial  will  augment  their  loveli- 
ness in  added   expanse  of  foliage  and  in  greater 


The  Home  of  Shakespeare.  167 

wealth  of  floral  luxuriance.  The  mellow  tinge  of 
age  will  soften  the  bright  tints  of  the  red  brick 
which  mainly  composes  the  building.  On  its  cone- 
shaped  turrets  ivy  will  clamber  and  moss  will 
nestle.  When  a  few  generations  have  passed,  the 
old  town  of  Stratford  will  have  adopted  this  now 
youthful  stranger  into  the  race  of  her  venerated 
antiquities.  The  same  air  of  poetic  mystery  which 
rests  now  upon  his  cottage  and  his  grave  will  diffuse 
itself  around  his  Memorial  ;  and  a  remote  poster- 
ity, looking  back  to  the  men  and  the  ideas  of  to-day, 
will  remember  with  grateful  pride  that  English- 
speaking  people  of  the  nineteenth  century,  though 
they  could  confer  no  honour  upon  the  great  name  of 
Shakespeare,  yet  honoured  themselves  in  conse- 
crating this  beautiful  temple  to  his  memory. 


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